Well, I did what I could. It began with John Henry bringing home some of them that worked in his office to spend the evening now and again, and they told other fellows and asked leave to bring them in too. And before long it got to be that there never was an evening there wasn"t some of them there, "Aunt-Pattying" me. I told them from the start I would _not_ be called Miss. When a woman has been Miss for forty-five years she gets tired of it.
So Aunt Patty it was, and Aunt Patty it remained, and I loved all those dear boys as if they"d been my own. They told me all their troubles, and I mothered them and cheered them up and scolded them, and finally topped off with a jolly good supper; for, talk as you like, you can"t preach much good into a boy if he"s got an aching void in his stomach. Fill _that_ up with tasty victuals, and then you can do something with his spiritual nature. If a boy is well stuffed with good things and then won"t listen to advice, you might as well stop wasting your breath on him, because there is something radically wrong with him. Probably his grandfather had dyspepsia. And a dyspeptic ancestor is worse for a boy than predestination, in my opinion.
Anyway, most of my boys took to going to church and Bible cla.s.s of their own accord, after I"d been their aunt for awhile. The young minister thought it was all his doings, and I let him think so to keep him cheered up. He was a nice boy himself, and often dropped in of an evening too; but I never would let him talk theology until after supper. His views always seemed so much mellower then, and didn"t puzzle the other boys more than was wholesome for them.
This went on for five glorious years, the only years of my life I"d ever _lived_, and then came, as I thought, the end of everything. John Henry took typhoid and died. At first that was all I could think of; and when I got so that I could think of other things, there was, as I have said, nothing for me to do but go back east.
The boys, who had been as good as gold to me all through my trouble, felt dreadfully bad over this, and coaxed me hard to stay. They said if I"d start a boarding house I"d have all the boarders I could accommodate; but I knew it was no use to think of that, because I wasn"t strong enough, and help was so hard to get. No, there was nothing for it but Northfield and stagnation again, with not a stray boy anywhere to mother. I looked the dismal prospect square in the face and made up my mind to it.
But I was determined to give my boys one good celebration before I went, anyway. It was near Thanksgiving, and I resolved they should have a dinner that would keep my memory green for awhile, a real old-fashioned Thanksgiving dinner such as they used to have at home. I knew it would cost more than I could really afford, but I shut my eyes to that aspect of the question. I was going back to strict eastern economy for the rest of my days, and I meant to indulge in one wild, blissful riot of extravagance before I was cooped up again.
I counted up the boys I must have, and there were fifteen, including the minister. I invited them a fortnight ahead to make sure of getting them, though I needn"t have worried, for they all said they would have broken an engagement to dine with the king for one of my dinners. The minister said he had been feeling so homesick he was afraid he wouldn"t be able to preach a real thankful sermon, but now he was comfortably sure that his sermon would be overflowing with grat.i.tude.
I just threw myself heart and soul into the preparations for that dinner. I had three turkeys and two sucking pigs, and mince pies and pumpkin pies and apple pies, and doughnuts and fruit cake and cranberry sauce and brown bread, and ever so many other things to fill up the c.h.i.n.ks. The night before Thanksgiving everything was ready, and I was so tired I could hardly talk to Jimmy Nelson when he dropped in.
Jimmy had something on his mind, I saw that. So I said, ""Fess up, Jimmy, and then you"ll be able to enjoy your call."
"I want to ask a favour of you, Aunt Patty," said Jimmy.
I knew I should have to grant it; n.o.body could refuse Jimmy anything, he looked so much like a nice, clean, pink-and-white little schoolboy whose mother had just scrubbed his face and told him to be good. At the same time he was one of the wildest young scamps in Carleton, or had been until a year ago. I"d got him well set on the road to reformation, and I felt worse about leaving him than any of the rest of them. I knew he was just at the critical point. With somebody to tide him over the next half year he"d probably go straight for the rest of his life, but if he were left to himself he"d likely just slip back to his old set and ways.
"I want you to let me bring my Uncle Joe to dinner tomorrow," said Jimmy. "The poor old fellow is stranded here for Thanksgiving, and he hates hotels. May I?"
"Of course," I said heartily, wondering why Jimmy seemed to think I mightn"t want his Uncle Joe. "Bring him right along."
"Thanks," said Jimmy. "He"ll be more than pleased. Your sublime cookery will delight him. He adores the west, but he can"t endure its cooking. He"s always harping on his mother"s pantry and the good old down-east dinners. He"s dyspeptic and pessimistic most of the time, and he"s got half a dozen cronies just like himself. All they think of is railroads and bills of fare."
"Railroads!" I cried. And then an awful thought a.s.sailed me. "Jimmy Nelson, your uncle isn"t--isn"t--he can"t be Joseph P. Nelson, the _rich_ Joseph P. Nelson!"
"Oh, he"s rich enough," said Jimmy; getting up and reaching for his hat. "In dollars, that is. Some ways he"s poor enough. Well, I must be going. Thanks ever so much for letting me bring Uncle Joe."
And that rascal was gone, leaving me crushed. Joseph Nelson was coming to my house to dinner--Joseph P. Nelson, the millionaire railroad king, who kept his own chef and was accustomed to dining with the great ones of the earth!
I was afraid I should never be able to forgive Jimmy. I couldn"t sleep a wink that night, and I cooked that dinner next day in a terrible state of mind. Every ring that came at the door made my heart jump,--but in the end Jimmy didn"t ring at all, but just walked in with his uncle in tow. The minute I saw Joseph P. I knew I needn"t be scared of _him_; he just looked real common. He was little and thin and kind of bored-looking, with grey hair and whiskers, and his clothes were next door to downright shabbiness. If it hadn"t been for the thought of that chef, I wouldn"t have felt a bit ashamed of my old-fashioned Thanksgiving spread.
When Joseph P. sat down to that table he stopped looking bored. All the time the minister was saying grace that man simply stared at a big plate of doughnuts near my end of the table, as if he"d never seen anything like them before.
All the boys talked and laughed while they were eating, but Joseph P.
just _ate_, tucking away turkey and vegetables and keeping an anxious eye on those doughnuts, as if he was afraid somebody else would get hold of them before his turn came. I wished I was sure it was etiquette to tell him not to worry because there were plenty more in the pantry. By the time he"d been helped three times to mince pie I gave up feeling bad about the chef. He finished off with the doughnuts, and I shan"t tell how many of them he devoured, because I would not be believed.
Most of the boys had to go away soon after dinner. Joseph P. shook hands with me absently and merely said, "Good afternoon, Miss Porter." I didn"t think he seemed at all grateful for his dinner, but that didn"t worry me because it was for my boys I"d got it up, and not for dyspeptic millionaires whose digestion had been spoiled by private chefs. And my boys had appreciated it, there wasn"t any doubt about that. Peter Crockett and Tommy Gray stayed to help me wash the dishes, and we had the jolliest time ever. Afterward we picked the turkey bones.
But that night I realized that I was once more a useless, lonely old woman. I cried myself to sleep, and next morning I hadn"t s.p.u.n.k enough to cook myself a dinner. I dined off some crackers and the remnants of the apple pies, and I was sitting staring at the crumbs when the bell rang. I wiped away my tears and went to the door. Joseph P. Nelson was standing there, and he said, without wasting any words--it was easy to see how that man managed to get railroads built where n.o.body else could manage it--that he had called to see me on a little matter of business.
He took just ten minutes to make it clear to me, and when I saw the whole project I was the happiest woman in Carleton or out of it. He said he had never eaten such a Thanksgiving dinner as mine, and that I was the woman he"d been looking for for years. He said that he had a few business friends who had been brought up on a down-east farm like himself, and never got over their hankering for old-fashioned cookery.
"That is something we can"t get here, with all our money," he said.
"Now, Miss Porter, my nephew tells me that you wish to remain in Carleton, if you can find some way of supporting yourself. I have a proposition to make to you. These aforesaid friends of mine and I expect to spend most of our time in Carleton for the next few years.
In fact we shall probably make it our home eventually. It"s going to be _the_ city of the west after awhile, and the centre of a dozen railroads. Well, we mean to equip a small private restaurant for ourselves and we want you to take charge of it. You won"t have to do much except oversee the business and arrange the bills of fare. We want plain, substantial old-time meals and cookery. When we have a hankering for doughnuts and apple pies and cranberry tarts, we want to know just where to get them and have them the right kind. We"re all horribly tired of hotel fare and fancy fol-de-rols with French names.
A place where we could get a dinner such as you served yesterday would be a boon to us. We"d have started the restaurant long ago if we could have got a suitable person to take charge of it."
He named the salary the club would pay and the very sound of it made me feel rich. You may be sure I didn"t take long to decide. That was a year ago, and today the Doughnut Club, as they call themselves, is a huge success, and the fame of it has gone abroad in the land, although they are pretty exclusive and keep all their good things close enough to themselves. Joseph P. took a Scotch peer there to dinner one day last week. Jimmy Nelson told me afterward that the man said it was the only satisfying meal he"d had since he left the old country.
As for me, I have my little house, my very own and no rented one, and all my dear boys, and I"m a happy old busybody. You see, Providence did answer my prayers in spite of my lack of faith; but of course He used means, and that Thanksgiving dinner of mine was the earthly instrument of it all.
The Girl Who Drove the Cows
"I wonder who that pleasant-looking girl who drives cows down the beech lane every morning and evening is," said Pauline Palmer, at the tea table of the country farmhouse where she and her aunt were spending the summer. Mrs. Wallace had wanted to go to some fashionable watering place, but her husband had bluntly told her he couldn"t afford it. Stay in the city when all her set were out she would not, and the aforesaid farmhouse had been the compromise.
"I shouldn"t suppose it could make any difference to you who she is,"
said Mrs. Wallace impatiently. "I do wish, Pauline, that you were more careful in your choice of a.s.sociates. You hobn.o.b with everyone, even that old man who comes around buying eggs. It is very bad form."
Pauline hid a rather undutiful smile behind her napkin. Aunt Olivia"s sn.o.bbish opinions always amused her.
"You"ve no idea what an interesting old man he is," she said. "He can talk more entertainingly than any other man I know. What is the use of being so exclusive, Aunt Olivia? You miss so much fun. You wouldn"t be so horribly bored as you are if you fraternized a little with the "natives," as you call them."
"No, thank you," said Mrs. Wallace disdainfully.
"Well, I am going to try to get acquainted with that girl," said Pauline resolutely. "She looks nice and jolly."
"I don"t know where you get your low tastes from," groaned Mrs.
Wallace. "I"m sure it wasn"t from your poor mother. What do you suppose the Morgan Knowles would think if they saw you taking up with some tomboy girl on a farm?"
"I don"t see why it should make a great deal of difference what they would think, since they don"t seem to be aware of my existence, or even of yours, Aunty," said Pauline, with twinkling eyes. She knew it was her aunt"s dearest desire to get in with the Morgan Knowles"
"set"--a desire that seemed as far from being realized as ever. Mrs.
Wallace could never understand why the Morgan Knowles shut her from their charmed circle. They certainly a.s.sociated with people much poorer and of more doubtful worldly station than hers--the Markhams, for instance, who lived on an unfashionable street and wore quite shabby clothes. Just before she had left Colchester, Mrs. Wallace had seen Mrs. Knowles and Mrs. Markham together in the former"s automobile. James Wallace and Morgan Knowles were a.s.sociated in business dealings; but in spite of Mrs. Wallace"s schemings and aspirations and heart burnings, the a.s.sociation remained a purely business one and never advanced an inch in the direction of friendship.
As for Pauline, she was hopelessly devoid of social ambitions and she did not in the least mind the Morgan Knowles" remote att.i.tude.
"Besides," continued Pauline, "she isn"t a tomboy at all. She looks like a very womanly, well-bred sort of girl. Why should you think her a tomboy because she drives cows? Cows are placid, useful animals--witness this delicious cream which I am pouring over my blueberries. And they have to be driven. It"s an honest occupation."
"I daresay she is someone"s servant," said Mrs. Wallace contemptuously. "But I suppose even that wouldn"t matter to you, Pauline?"
"Not a mite," said Pauline cheerfully. "One of the very nicest girls I ever knew was a maid Mother had the last year of her dear life. I loved that girl, Aunt Olivia, and I correspond with her. She writes letters that are ten times more clever and entertaining than those stupid epistles Clarisse Gray sends me--and Clarisse Gray is a rich man"s daughter and is being educated in Paris."
"You are incorrigible, Pauline," said Mrs. Wallace hopelessly.
"Mrs. Boyd," said Pauline to their landlady, who now made her appearance, "who is that girl who drives the cows along the beech lane mornings and evenings?"
"Ada Cameron, I guess," was Mrs. Boyd"s response. "She lives with the Embrees down on the old Embree place just below here. They"re pasturing their cows on the upper farm this summer. Mrs. Embree is her father"s half-sister."
"Is she as nice as she looks?"
"Yes, Ada"s a real nice sensible girl," said Mrs. Boyd. "There is no nonsense about her."