Hilary stopped short at the foot of the porch steps. Patience"s remark, if it had not absolutely let the cat out of the bag, had at least opened the bag. "Paul, it can"t be--"
"In the Shaw"s dictionary, at present, there doesn"t appear to be any such word as can"t," Pauline declared. "Come on---after all, you know, the only way to find out--is to find out."
Patience had danced on ahead down the path to the barn. She stood waiting for them now in the broad open doorway, her whole small person one animated exclamation point, while Towser, just home from a leisurely round of afternoon visits, came forward to meet Hilary, wagging a dignified welcome.
"If you don"t hurry, I"ll "hi yi" you, like I do f.a.n.n.y!" Patience warned them. She moved to one side, to let Hilary go on into the barn.
"Now!" she demanded, "isn"t that something more?"
From the stall beside f.a.n.n.y"s, a horse"s head reached inquiringly out for the sugar with which already she had come to a.s.sociate the frequent visits of these new friends. She was a pretty, well-made, little mare, light sorrel, with white markings, and with a slender, intelligent face.
Hilary stood motionless, too surprised to speak.
"Her name"s Bedelia," Patience said, doing the honors. "She"s very clever, she knows us all already. f.a.n.n.y hasn"t been very polite to her, and she knows it--Bedelia does, I mean--sometimes, when f.a.n.n.y isn"t looking, I"ve caught Bedelia sort of laughing at her--and I don"t blame her one bit. And, oh, Hilary, she can go--there"s no need to "hi yi" her."
"But--" Hilary turned to Pauline.
"Uncle Paul sent her," Pauline explained. "She came last Sat.u.r.day afternoon. One of the men from Uncle Paul"s place in the country brought her. She was born and bred at River Lawn--that"s Uncle Paul"s place--he says."
Hilary stroked the glossy neck gently, if Pauline had said the Sultan of Turkey, instead of Uncle Paul, she could hardly have been more surprised. "Uncle Paul--sent her to you!" she said slowly.
"To _us_."
"Bless me, that isn"t all he sent," Patience exclaimed. It seemed to Patience that they never would get to the end of their story. "You just come look at this, Hilary Shaw!" she ran on through the opening connecting carriage-house with stable.
"Oh!" Hilary cried, following with Pauline.
Beside the minister"s shabby old gig, stood the smartest of smart traps, and hanging on the wall behind it, a pretty russet harness, with silver mountings.
Hilary sat down on an old saw horse; she felt again as though she must be dreaming.
"There isn"t another such cute rig in town, Jim says so," Patience said. Jim was the stable boy. "It beats Bell Ward"s all to pieces."
"But why--I mean, how did Uncle Paul ever come to send it to us?"
Hilary said. Of course one had always known that there was--somewhere--a person named Uncle Paul; but he had appeared about as remote and indefinite a being as--that same Sultan of Turkey, for instance.
"After all, why shouldn"t he?" Pauline answered.
"But I don"t believe he would"ve if Paul had not written to him that time," Patience added. "Maybe next time I tell you anything, you"ll believe me, Hilary Shaw."
But Hilary was staring at Pauline. "You didn"t write to Uncle Paul?"
"I"m afraid I did."
"Was--was that the letter--you remember, that afternoon?"
"I rather think I do remember."
"Paul, how did you ever dare?"
"I was in the mood to dare anything that day."
"And did he answer; but of course he did."
"Yes--he answered. Though not right away."
"Was it a nice letter? Did he mind your having written? Paul, you didn"t ask him to send you--these," Hilary waved her hand rather vaguely.
"Hardly--he did that all on his own. It wasn"t a bad sort of letter, I"ll tell you about it by and by. We can go to the manor in style now, can"t we--even if father can"t spare f.a.n.n.y. Bedelia"s perfectly gentle, I"ve driven her a little ways once or twice, to make sure.
Father insisted on going with me. We created quite a sensation down street, I a.s.sure you."
"And Mrs. Dane said," Patience cut in, "that in her young days, clergymen didn"t go kiting "bout the country in such high-fangled rigs."
"Never mind what Mrs. Dane said, or didn"t say," Pauline told her.
"Miranda says, what Mrs. Dane hasn"t got to say on any subject, wouldn"t make you tired listening to it."
"Patience, if you don"t stop repeating what everyone says, I shall--"
"If you speak to mother--then you"ll be repeating," Patience declared.
"Maybe, I oughtn"t to have said those things before--company."
"I think we"d better go back to the house now," Pauline suggested.
"s.e.xtoness Jane says," Patience remarked, "that she"d have sure admired to have a horse and rig like that, when she was a girl. She says, she doesn"t suppose you"ll be pa.s.sing by her house very often."
"And, now, please," Hilary pleaded, when she had been established in her hammock on the side porch, with her mother in her chair close by, and Pauline sitting on the steps, "I want to hear--everything. I"m what Miranda calls "fair mazed.""
So Pauline told nearly everything, blurring some of the details a little and getting to that twenty-five dollars a month, with which they were to do so much, as quickly as possible.
"O Paul, really," Hilary sat up among her cushions--"Why, it"ll be--riches, won"t it?"
"It seems so."
"But--Oh, I"m afraid you"ve spent all the first twenty-five on me; and that"s not a fair division--is it, Mother Shaw?"
"We used it quite according to Hoyle," Pauline insisted. "We got our fun that way, didn"t we, Mother Shaw?"
Their mother smiled. "I know I did."
"All the same, after this, you"ve simply got to "drink fair, Betsy," so remember," Hilary warned them.
"Bedtime, Patience," Mrs. Shaw said, and Patience got slowly out of her big, wicker armchair.
"I did think--seeing there was company,--that probably you"d like me to stay up a little later to-night."
"If the "company" takes my advice, she"ll go, too," her mother answered.
"The "company" thinks she will." Hilary slipped out of the hammock.