Not once, but half a dozen times, he turned in the road to glance over his shoulder at the house he had left behind. Always his gaze went to the scarecrow. He shivered slightly and cursed himself for a fool. The silly thing COULDN"T be looking at him! What nonsense!
Still he breathed a sigh of relief when he turned the bend and was safely screened from view by the grove of oaks that crowned the hill above the village.
Several automobiles pa.s.sed him as he trudged along the pike; an old man afoot driving a little herd of sheep gave him a cheery "good morning," but received no response.
"I wish I hadn"t gone into that beastly house," he was repeating to himself, a scowl in his eyes. "It gave me the "w.i.l.l.i.e.s." Jolly lot of satisfaction I got out of it,--I don"t think. I daresay he kissed her a good many times up there in that,--But, Lord, what"s the sense of worrying about something that happened ten years ago?"
At the dinner table that noon, Charlie Webster suddenly inquired:
"Well, what have YOU been up to this morning, Court?"
Courtney started guiltily and shot a quick, inquiring look at the speaker. Satisfied that there was no veiled significance in Charlie"s question, he replied:
"Took a long ramble up the pike. The air is like wine today. I walked out as far as the old Windom house."
Charlie was interested. "Is that so? Did you see Amos Vick"s daughter hanging around the place?"
"Amos Vick"s--you mean Rosabel?" He swallowed hard. "No, I didn"t see her. Was she over there?"
"Jim Bagley was in the office half an hour or so ago. As he was coming past the house in his Ford he saw her standing at the front gate, so he stopped and asked her what she was doing over on this side of the river. She"d been over here spending the night with Annie Jordan,--that"s Phil Jordan"s girl, you know, the township a.s.sessor,--and went out for a long walk this morning. She looked awful tired and sort of sickly, so Jim told her to hop in and he"d give her a lift back to Phil"s house. She got in with him and he left her at Phil"s."
"I saw her walking down to the ferry with Annie as I was coming over from the office a little while ago," said Doc Simpson.
"Sorry I didn"t meet her," said Courtney. "She"s jolly good fun,--and I certainly was in need of somebody to cheer me up this morning.
For the first time since I came out here I was homesick for New York,--and mother. It must have been our talk last night about the theatres and all that."
CHAPTER XII
WORDS AND LETTEBS
Mary Blythe and her brother arrived on Tuesday for a two days" visit.
Alix motored to town and brought them out in the automobile. She was surprised and gratified when Courtney, revoking his own decree, volunteered to go up with her to meet the visitors at the railway station in the city. But when the day came, he was ill and unable to leave his room. The cold, steady rains of the past few days had brought on an attack of pleurisy, and the doctor ordered him to remain in bed. He grumbled a great deal over missing the little dinner Alix was giving on the first night of their stay, and sent more than one lamentation forth in the shape of notes carried up to the house on the knoll by Jim House, the venerable handy-man at Dowd"s Tavern.
"I really don"t recall him," said Addison Blythe, frowning thoughtfully. "He probably came to the sector after I left, Miss Crown. I"ve got a complete roster at home of all the fellows who served in the American Ambulance up to the time it was taken over.
I"d like to meet him. I may have run across him any number of times.
Names didn"t mean much, you see, except in cases where we hung out together in one place for some time. I would remember his face, of course. Faces made impressions, and that"s more than names did.
Courtney Thane? Seems to me I have a vague recollection of that name. You say he was afterward flying with the British?"
"Yes. He was wounded and ga.s.sed at--at--let me think. What was the name of the place? Only a few weeks before the armistice."
"There was a great deal doing a few weeks before the armistice,"
said Blythe, smiling. "You"ll have to be a little more definite than that. The air was full of British aeroplanes from London clear to Palestine. What is he doing here?"
"Recovering his health. He has had two attacks of pneumonia, you see,--and a touch of typhoid. His family originally lived in this country. The old Thane farm is almost directly across the river from Windomville. Courtney"s father was born there, but went east to live during the first Cleveland administration. He had some kind of a political appointment in Washington, and married a Congressman"s daughter from Georgia, I think--anyhow, it was one of the Southern states. He is really quite fascinating, Mary. You would lose your heart to him, I am sure."
"And, pray, have you offered any reward for yours?" inquired Mary Blythe, smiling as she studied her friend"s face rather narrowly.
Alix met her challenging gaze steadily. A sharper observer than Mary Blythe might have detected the faintest shadow of a cloud in the dark, honest eyes.
"When I lose it, dear, I shall say "good riddance" and live happily ever after without one," she replied airily.
The next morning she started off with her guests for a drive down the river, to visit the old fort and the remains of the Indian village. Stopping at the grain elevator, she beckoned to Charlie Webster. The fat little manager came bustling out, beaming with pleasure.
"How is Mr. Thane today, Charlie?" she inquired, after introducing him to the Blythes.
Charlie pursed his lips and looked wise. "Well, all I can say is, he"s doing as well as could be expected. Temperature normal, pulse fluctuating, appet.i.te good, respiration improved by a good many cusswords, mustard plaster itching like all get out,--but otherwise he"s at the point of death. I was in to see him after breakfast.
He was sitting up in bed and getting ready to tell Doc Smith what he thinks of him for ordering him to stay in the house till he says he can go out. He is terribly upset because he can"t get up to Alix"s to see you, Mr. Blythe. I never saw a feller so cut up about a thing as he is."
"He must not think of coming out in this kind of weather," cried Alix firmly. "It would be--"
"Oh, he"s not thinking of coming out," interrupted Charlie quietly.
"I am sorry not to have met him," said Blythe. "We probably have a lot of mutual friends."
A queer little light flashed into Charlie Webster"s eyes and lingered for an instant.
"He"s terribly anxious to meet you. It wouldn"t surprise me at all if he got up today sometime and in spite of Doc Smith hustled over to call on you. I"ll tell you what we might do, Alix. If Mr. Blythe isn"t going to be too busy, I might take him up to see Court,--that is, when you get back from your drive. I know he"ll appreciate it, and be tickled almost to death."
"Fine!" cried Blythe. "If you"re sure he will not mind, Mr. Webster."
"Why should he mind? He says he"s crazy to meet you, and he"s able to see people--"
"But I"ve always understood that talking was very painful to any one suffering from pleurisy," protested Alix.
"Doesn"t seem to hurt Court very much," declared Charlie. "He nearly talked an arm off of me and Furman Hatch this morning,--and it certainly seemed to be a real pleasure for him to cuss. I really think he"ll get well quicker if you drop in for a chat with him, Mr. Blythe."
"It would be very nice," said Alix warmly, "if you could run in for a few minutes--"
"Sure I will," cried the young man. "This afternoon, Mr. Webster,--about half-past two?"
"Any time suits me," said the obliging Mr. Webster. As if struck by something irresistibly funny, he suddenly put his hand to his mouth and got very red in the face. After an illy-suppressed snort or two, he coughed violently, and then stammered: "Excuse me. I was just thinking about--er--about something funny. I"m always doing some fool thing like that. This was about Ed Jones"s dog,--wouldn"t be the least bit funny to anybody but me, so I won"t tell you about it. Two-thirty it is, then? I"ll meet you up at Alix"s. It"s only a step."
"Will you tell Mr. Thane that you are bringing Mr. Blythe to see him this afternoon, Charlie?" said Alix. "You said he was threatening to disobey the doctor"s--"
"You leave it to me, Alix," broke in Charlie rea.s.suringly. "Trust me to see that he don"t escape."
A little before two-thirty, tall Mr. Blythe, one time Captain in the Field Artillery, and short Mr. Webster wended their way through the once busy stableyard in the rear of Dowd"s Tavern. Charlie gave his companion a brief history of the Tavern and indicated certain venerable and venerated objects of interest,--such as the ancient log watering-trough (hewn in 1832); the rain-barrels, ash-hoppers and fodder cribs (dating back to Civil War days), the huge kettle suspended from a thick iron bar the ends of which were supported by rusty standards, where apple-b.u.t.ter was made at one season of the year, lye at another, and where lard was rendered at butchering-time.
He took him into the wagon-shed and showed him the rickety high-wheeled, top-heavy carriage used by the first of the Dowds back in the forties, now ready to fall to pieces at the slightest ungentle shake; the once gaudy sleigh with its great curved "runners"; and over in a dark corner two long barrelled rifles with rusty locks and rotten stocks, that once upon a time cracked the doom of deer and wolf and fox, of catamount and squirrel and c.o.o.n, of wild turkeys and geese and ducks--to say nothing of an occasional horsethief.
"They say old man Dowd could shoot the eye out of a squirrel three hundreds yards away with one of these rifles," announced Charlie; "and it was no trick at all for him to nip a wild turkey"s head off at five hundred yards. I"ll bet you didn"t run up against any such shooting as that over in France."
Blythe shook his head. "No such rifle shooting, I grant you. But what would you say to a German cannon twelve miles away landing ten sh.e.l.ls in succession on a battery half as big as this stable without even being able to see the thing they were shooting at?"
"I give up," said Charlie gloomily. "Old man Dowd was SOME liar, but, my gosh, he couldn"t hold a--well, my respect for the American Army is greater than it ever was, I"ll say that, Captain. Dan Dowd was the rankest kind of an amateur."