"Please, Sube!" Mrs. Cane was very gentle, but very much in earnest.
"Please don"t ever say that again. It might get back to Mrs.
Hotchkiss-Harger"s ears, and if it did it would offend her terribly. She isn"t in a very humorous state just now, and she couldn"t possibly see the joke. It would be a very serious matter if she should be offended by any member of our family as she is about the most important client I have just now. You won"t ever mention this matter again, will you, my boy?"
"Oh, no! Not if you don"t want me to. But we all know he _was_ a tight-wad, don"t we?"
If Sube had desired to mention the matter to Mrs. Hotchkiss-Harger, which no doubt he would have done at the first propitious opportunity, he would have had no chance until the next evening; for he did not see her until then. But when he saw her he did not go out of his way to converse with her. He made himself as small as possible and started for the farther end of the room.
He was one of nineteen of Nancy"s little friends who were a.s.sembled in the library chattering like magpies, while, beyond the closely drawn parlor curtains, her father and mother were lighting the candles on the Christmas tree. One moment the young people were fairly on tip-toe with pleasant antic.i.p.ations--and the next they were silent and shocked.
For the front door of the house had suddenly burst open, and in rushed a tall woman heavily veiled, and generously cloaked in broadtail. As she entered, she had involuntarily called on her Maker for help; and as if the response were not sufficiently prompt, she sought to enlist the additional aid of her sister, whose name she moaned rather than called.
At her entrance the buzzing library became as silent as the third strike; but when she began to repeat her sister"s name with increasing anguish, there were quick movements to points of vantage near the door, and several of the more venturesome boys poked their heads out and stared.
The confusion in the hall did not last long, however, for Mrs. Guilford came flying from the parlor, and taking her sister into her capable arms led her gently down the hall and into a side room, the door of which she quickly closed behind them.
"What are "vandals"?" asked Biscuit Westfall of Sube as the company began to breathe again.
"Vandals?"
"Yes, vandals. She said vandals had desecrated the resting place of her poor dear Clarence."
"Did she say that?"
"She sure did! What are they, anyway? Are they an"thing like woodchucks?"
At this point Mr. Guilford threw back the curtains, and the a.s.semblage trooped into the parlor with exclamations of great joy. The servants slipped in from the kitchen to see the tree and watch the children; and Mrs. Guilford found them cl.u.s.tered about the parlor door as she came softly out of her sister"s room a few moments later.
Mr. Guilford had already a.s.sumed the role of an uncostumed Santa Claus, and the sounds of merriment were increasing with each package he clipped from the tree and delivered, and when Mrs. Guilford picked up a pair of shears and began to a.s.sist him, the uproar became deafening.
Suddenly all was hushed by an anguished moan.
As Mrs. Guilford dropped her shears and started for the door her worst suspicions were confirmed; for she caught sight of the towering form of her widowed sister with her hands pressed closely together in an att.i.tude of supplication, and her eyes turned heavenwards.
"G.o.d help me! It"s the very one!" she mumbled over and over. "G.o.d help me! It"s the very one!"
In an instant Mrs. Guilford was at her sister"s side; but her efforts to lead her from the room were futile.
"No! I must examine it! I have proof!... I can tell!... I can identify it!... When I saw that it had been cut down I scrutinized the stump, and G.o.d had been good to me! He had put a little black ring around the heart! It is a _sign!_ ... I must turn over that tree and examine--!"
"Not _now_, dear; you"re all upset--"
"Yes, now--this instant!"
"But it"s all lighted--the children are all here! We must wait until they have finished and gone into the dining-room, and then you can do anything you want to. But not just now--"
And again Mrs. Guilford led her distraught sister down the hall and into the side room.
It was the firm conviction of all the children save two, that the tall lady in black was crazy (a conviction of which some of them were never able to rid themselves in after years), and they did not hesitate to whisper about it among themselves.
The two who entertained no doubt as to the soundness of her mind were Sube and Nancy. To them her verbal wanderings about the little black ring had been perfectly lucid. But no look of understanding pa.s.sed between them. In fact, their eyes did not squarely meet again during the entire evening, although neither one was for an instant unaware of the other"s exact location.
Observing that Sube was standing by the tree, Nancy made her way thither by devious wanderings; but when she reached the tree she found that Sube had moved over by the doorway leading into the hall. She started in that direction, but before she had come up to him, the first call to supper was sounded; and by the time that she had reached the dining-room she found him securely seated between Cottontop Sigsbee and Stucky Richards.
In some mysterious way an exchange of seats was effected between Nancy and Cottontop; but no sooner had Cottontop yielded his seat to the hostess than Sube had slipped quickly across the room and hauled Biscuit Westfall from his seat, of which he at once took possession with the announcement that he and Biscuit had also swapped.
This was an act of plain insanity; for of course nothing remained for Biscuit to do except to go over and seat himself beside Nancy. It would have been difficult to decide which Sube would have kicked the harder, himself or Biscuit, had he been given a "free kick" at that moment. But he had no such good fortune.
Instead, he was compelled to sit idly by and look helplessly on at Biscuit and Nancy in close and apparently very intimate conversation. Of course Sube had no way of knowing that Nancy was simply a.s.suring Biscuit that she would at once effect an exchange of seats with the lady at Sube"s side, and thus restore Biscuit to the damsel of his choice.
The situation quickly became intolerable to Sube, and under cover of the confusion caused by the entry of a corps of waitresses bearing napkins and plates, he contrived to escape into the hall. This was his first false step; but others quickly followed.
For, finding n.o.body in the hall to observe him, he slipped into the deserted parlor. This was done with no definite purpose other than a desire to remove himself from a painful sight; the boy was simply wandering in the midst of a haze of bewildered jealousy--until his eyes fell on the Christmas tree. And then he came to his senses with a perceptible b.u.mp.
If the tree was really a witness against him, he ought to know it. If there _was_ a little black ring around the trunk surely it had escaped his attention. The candles had all been extinguished; there could be no possible harm in examining the trunk, and then he would be sure. He was drawn to the spot with all the fascination of a murderer for the scene of his crime.
He tipped the tree and attempted to peer under the box in which it stood, when in some way it got away from him and fell to the floor with a tremendous crash, the tinkling ornaments flying in all directions.
But alas! There was no opening through the bottom of the box!
As he stood glowering over the prostrate tree, he heard his name called.
At almost the same instant he heard Mr. Guilford asking what the crash was. Hurried footsteps in the hall became audible. He was caught red-handed!
He glanced around desperately for a window through which he might essay a dive, when he spied
[Ill.u.s.tration]
a door that he had not previously noticed; and quickly opening it he peered into what seemed to be a deserted bedroom. He stepped inside, softly closing the door after him. As he stood listening he heard the sound of excited voices in the parlor. Then he heard a rustling from the vicinity of the bed, and the deep voice of Mrs. Hotchkiss-Harger saying languidly:
"I"m not asleep, Bridget.... Put the tray on the table.... I don"t feel as if I should ever be able to taste another morsel of food ... but I suppose you may as well leave it.... And, Bridget, I seem to feel a draft from that window; would you mind closing it."
Sube glanced gratefully at the partly opened French window, and closed it, but not until he was on the outside. Then he threw himself over the railing of the veranda and jumped to the ground, and he was nearly a block away before he so much as paused for breath.
Then it suddenly came to him that it was bitterly cold, that there was snow on the ground, and that his overcoat and cap were peacefully reposing on the bed in the Guilfords" chilly guest chamber.
If the weather had been a little more favorable he might have held out; he might even have started for parts unknown. But the combination of mental anguish and physical discomfort was too much for him. He simply could not go back to Guilfords". He had burned his bridges behind him too effectually to permit that. The frosty night air seemed to have numbed his. .h.i.therto ready imagination, for he could think of only one other place to go; and that was home.
But what could he tell his father and mother? They surely would demand an explanation. And for once he found himself utterly unable to think of a suitable lie. Then suddenly like a flash from the sky came an inspiration.
Why not try the truth!
George Washington had tried it once on a tree-cutting sc.r.a.pe, and had made it work. And why couldn"t _he_?
CHAPTER x.x.x
THE TRUTH