Chapter 9

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_ Chapter IX

"Now, Henry," said Mrs. Daggett, as she smilingly set a plate of perfectly browned pancakes before her husband, which he proceeded to deluge with butter and maple syrup, "are you sure that's _so_, about the furniture? 'Cause if it is, we've got two or three o' them things right in this house: that chair you're settin' in, for one, an' upstairs there's that ol' fashioned brown bureau, where I keep the sheets 'n' pillow slips. You don't s'pose she'd want that, do you?"

Mrs. Daggett sank down in a chair opposite her husband, her large pink and white face damp with moisture. Above her forehead a mist of airy curls fluttered in the warm breeze from the open window.

"My, ain't it hot!" she sighed. "I got all het up a-bakin' them cakes. Shall I fry you another griddleful, papa?"

"They cer'nly do taste kind o' moreish, Abby," conceded Mr. Daggett thickly. "You do beat the Dutch, Abby, when it comes t' pancakes. Mebbe I could manage a few more of 'em."

Mrs. Daggett beamed sincerest satisfaction.

"Oh, I don't know," she deprecated happily. "Ann Whittle says I don't mix batter the way she does. But if _you_ like 'em, Henry--"

"Couldn't be beat, Abby," affirmed Mr. Daggett sturdily, as he reached for his third cup of coffee.

The cook stove was only a few steps away, so the sizzle of the batter as it expanded into generous disks on the smoking griddle did not interrupt the conversation. Mrs. Daggett, in her blue and white striped gingham, a pancake turner in one plump hand, smiled through the odorous blue haze like a tutelary goddess. Mr. Daggett, in his shirt-sleeves, his scant locks brushed carefully over his bald spot, gazed at her with placid satisfaction. He was thoroughly accustomed to having Abby wait upon his appetite.

"I got to get down to the store kind of early this morning, Abby," he observed, frowning slightly at his empty plate.

"I'll have 'em for you in two shakes of a lamb's tail, papa," soothed Mrs. Daggett, to whom the above remark had come to signify not merely a statement of fact, but a gentle reprimand. "I know you like 'em good and hot; and cold buckwheat cakes certainly is about th' meanest vict'als.... There!"

And she transferred a neat pile of the delicate, crisp rounds from the griddle to her husband's plate with a skill born of long practice.

"About that furnitur'," remarked Mr. Daggett, gazing thoughtfully at the golden stream of sweetness, stolen from leaf and branch of the big sugar maples behind the house to supply the pewter syrup-jug he suspended above his cakes, "I guess it's a fact she wants it, all right."

"I should think she'd rather have new furniture; Henry, they do say the house is going to be handsome. But you say she wants the old stuff? Ain't that queer, for anybody with means."

"Well, that Orr girl beats me," Mr. Daggett acknowledged handsomely. "She seems kind of soft an' easy, when you talk to her; but she's got ideas of her own; an' you can't no more talk 'em out of her--"

"Why should you try to talk 'em out of her, papa?" inquired Mrs. Daggett mildly. "Mebbe her ideas is all right; and anyhow, s'long as she's paying out good money--"

"Oh, she'll pay! she'll pay!" said Mr. Daggett, with a large gesture. "Ain't no doubt about her paying for what she wants."

He shoved his plate aside, and tipped back in his chair with a heavy yawn.

"She's asked me to see about the wall paper, Abby," he continued, bringing down his chair with a resounding thump of its sturdy legs. "And she's got the most outlandish notions about it; asked me could I match up what was on the walls."

"Match it up? Why, ain't th' paper all moldered away, Henry, with the damp an' all?"

"'Course it is, Abby; but she says she wants to restore the house--fix it up just as 'twas. She says that's th' correct thing to do. 'Why, shucks!' I sez, 'the wall papers they're gettin' out now is a lot handsomer than them old style papers. You don't want no old stuff like that,' I sez. But, I swan! you can't tell that girl nothing, for all she seems so mild and meachin'. I was wonderin' if you couldn't shove some sense into her, Abby. Now, I'd like th' job of furnishin' up that house with new stuff. 'I don't carry a very big stock of furniture,' I sez to her; but--"

"Why, Hen-ery Daggett!" reproved his wife, "an' you a reg'lar professing member of the church! You ain't never carried no stock of furniture in the store, and you know it."

"That ain't no sign I ain't never goin' to, Abby," retorted Mr. Daggett with spirit. "We been stuck right down in the mud here in Brookville since that dratted bank failed. Nobody's moved, except to the graveyard. And here comes along a young woman with money ... I'd like mighty well to know just how much she's got an' where it come from. I asked the Judge, and he says, blamed if he knows.... But this 'ere young female spells op-per-tunity, Abby. We got to take advantage of the situation, Abby, same as you do in blackberrying season: pick 'em when they're ripe; if you don't, the birds and the bugs'll get 'em."

"It don't sound right to me, papa," murmured his wife, her kind face full of soft distress: "Taking advantage of a poor young thing, like her, an' all in mourning, too, fer a near friend. She told Lois so ... Dear, dear!"

Mr. Daggett had filled his morning pipe and was puffing energetically in his efforts to make it draw.

"I didn't _say_ take advantage of _her_," he objected. "That's somethin' I never done yet in my business, Abby. Th' Lord knows I don't sand my sugar nor water my vinegar, the way some storekeepers do. I'm all for 'live an' let live.' What I says was--... Now, you pay attention to me, Abby, and quit sniffling. You're a good woman; but you're about as soft as that there butter! ..."

The article in question had melted to a yellow pool under the heat. Mrs. Daggett gazed at it with wide blue eyes, like those of a child.

"Why, Henry," she protested, "I never heerd you talk so before."

"And likely you won't again. Now you listen, Abby; all I want, is to do what honest business I can with this young woman. She's bound to spend her money, and she's kind of took to me; comes into th' store after her mail, and hangs around and buys the greatest lot o' stuff-- 'Land!' I says to her: 'a body'd think you was getting ready to get married.'"

"Well, now I shouldn't wonder--" began Mrs. Daggett eagerly.

"Don't you get excited, Abby. She says she ain't; real pointed, too. But about this wall paper; I don't know as I can match up them stripes and figures. I wisht you'd go an' see her, Abby. She'll tell you all about it. An' her scheme about collecting all the old Bolton furniture is perfectly ridiculous. 'Twouldn't be worth shucks after kickin' 'round folk's houses here in Brookville for the last fifteen years or so."

"But you can't never find her at home, Henry," said Mrs. Daggett. "I been to see her lots of times; but Mis' Solomon Black says she don't stay in the house hardly long enough to eat her victuals."

"Why don't you take the buggy, Abby, and drive out to the old place?" suggested Mr. Daggett. "Likely you'll find her there. She appears to take an interest in every nail that's drove. I can spare the horse this afternoon just as well as not."

"'Twould be pleasant," purred Mrs. Daggett. "But, I suppose, by rights, I ought to take Lois along."

"Nope," disagreed her husband, shaking his head. "Don't you take Lois; she wouldn't talk confiding to Lois, the way she would to you. You've got a way with you, Abby. I'll bet you could coax a bird off a bush as easy as pie, if you was a mind to."

Mrs. Daggett's big body shook with soft laughter. She beamed rosily on her husband.

"How you do go on, Henry!" she protested. "But I ain't going to coax Lydia Orr off no bush she's set her heart on. She's got the sweetest face, papa; an' I know, without anybody telling me, whatever she does or wants to do is _all_ right."

Mr. Daggett had by now invested his portly person in a clean linen coat, bearing on its front the shining mark of Mrs. Daggett's careful iron.

"Same here, Abby," he said kindly: "whatever you do, Abby, suits _me_ all right."

The worthy couple parted for the morning: Mr. Daggett for the scene of his activities in the post office and store; Mrs. Daggett to set her house to rights and prepare for the noon meal, when her Henry liked to "eat hearty of good, nourishing victuals," after his light repast of the morning.

"Guess I'll wear my striped muslin," said Mrs. Daggett to herself happily. "Ain't it lucky it's all clean an' fresh? 'Twill be so cool to wear out buggy-ridin'."

Mrs. Daggett was always finding occasion for thus reminding herself of her astonishing good fortune. She had formed the habit of talking aloud to herself as she worked about the house and garden.

"'Tain't near as lonesome, when you can hear the sound of a voice--if it is only your own," she apologized, when rebuked for the practice by her friend Mrs. Maria Dodge. "Mebbe it does sound kind of crazy-- You say lunatics does it constant--but, I don't know, Maria, I've a kind of a notion there's them that hears, even if you can't see 'em. And mebbe they answer, too--in your thought-ear."

"You want to be careful, Abby," warned Mrs. Dodge, shaking her head. "It makes the chills go up and down my back to hear you talk like that; and they don't allow no such doctrines in the church."

"The Apostle Paul allowed 'em," Mrs. Daggett pointed out, "so did the Psalmist. You read your Bible, Maria, with that in mind, and you'll see."

In the spacious, sunlighted chamber of her soul, devoted to the memory of her two daughters who had died in early childhood, Mrs. Daggett sometimes permitted herself to picture Nellie and Minnie, grown to angelic girlhood, and keeping her company about her lonely household tasks in the intervals not necessarily devoted to harp playing in the Celestial City. She laughed softly to herself as she filled two pies with sliced sour apples and dusted them plentifully with spice and sugar.

"I'd admire to see papa argufying with that sweet girl," she observed to the surrounding silence. "Papa certainly is set on having his own way. Guess bin' alone here with me so constant, he's got kind of willful. But it don't bother me any; ain't that lucky?"

She hurried her completed pies into the oven with a swiftness of movement she had never lost, her sweet, thin soprano soaring high in the words of a winding old hymn tune:

Lord, how we grovel here below,
Fond of these trifling toys;
Our souls can neither rise nor go
To taste supernal joys! ...

It was nearly two o'clock before the big brown horse, indignant at the unwonted invasion of his afternoon leisure, stepped slowly out from the Daggett barn. On the seat of the old-fashioned vehicle, to which he had been attached by Mrs. Daggett's skillful hands, that lady herself sat placidly erect, arrayed in her blue and white striped muslin. Mrs. Daggett conscientiously wore stripes at all seasons of the year: she had read somewhere that stripes impart to the most rotund of figures an appearance of slimness totally at variance with the facts. As for blue and white, her favorite combination of stripes, any fabric in those colors looked cool and clean; and there was a vague strain of poetry in Mrs. Daggett's nature which made her lift her eyes to a blue sky filled with floating white clouds with a sense of rapturous satisfaction wholly unrelated to the state of the weather.

"G'long, Dolly!" she bade the reluctant animal, with a gentle slap of leathern reins over a rotund back. "Git-ap!"

"Dolly," who might have been called Caesar, both by reason of his sex and a stubbornly dominant nature, now fortunately subdued by years of chastening experience, strode slowly forward, his eyes rolling, his large hoofs stirring up heavy clouds of dust. There were sweet-smelling meadows stacked with newly-cured hay on either side of the road, and tufts of red clover blossoms exhaling delicious odors of honey almost under his saturnine nose; but he trotted ponderously on, sullenly aware of the gentle hand on the reins and the mild, persistent voice which bade him "Git-ap, Dolly!"

Miss Lois Daggett, carrying a black silk bag, which contained a prospectus of the invaluable work which she was striving to introduce to an unappreciative public, halted the vehicle before it had reached the outskirts of the village.

"Where you going, Abby?" she demanded, in the privileged tone of authority a wife should expect from her husband's female relatives.

"Just out in the country a piece, Lois," replied Mrs. Daggett evasively.

"Well, I guess I'll git in and ride a ways with you," said Lois Daggett. "Cramp your wheel, Abby," she added sharply. "I don't want to git my skirt all dust."

Miss Daggett was wearing a black alpaca skirt and a white shirtwaist, profusely ornamented with what is known as coronation braid. Her hair, very tightly frizzed, projected from beneath the brim of her straw hat on both sides.

"I'm going out to see if I can catch that Orr girl this afternoon," she explained, as she took a seat beside her sister-in-law. "She ought to want a copy of Famous People--in the best binding, too. I ain't sold a leather-bound yit, not even in Grenoble. They come in red with gold lettering. You'd ought to have one, Abby, now that Henry's gitting more business by the minute. I should think you might afford one, if you ain't too stingy."

"Mebbe we could, Lois," said Mrs. Daggett amiably. "I've always thought I'd like to know more about famous people: what they eat for breakfast, and how they do their back hair and--"

"Don't be silly, Abby," Miss Daggett bade her sharply. "There ain't any such nonsense in Famous People! _I_ wouldn't be canvassing for it, if there was." And she shifted her pointed nose to one side with a slight, genteel sniff.

"Git-ap, Dolly!" murmured Mrs. Daggett, gently slapping the reins.

Dolly responded by a single swift gesture of his tail which firmly lashed the hated reminder of bondage to his hind quarters. Then wickedly pretending that he was not aware of what had happened he strolled to the side of the road nearest the hay field.

"Now, if he ain't gone and got his tail over the lines!" cried Mrs. Daggett indignantly. "He's got more resistin' strength in that tail of his'n--wonder if I can--"

She leaned over the dashboard and grasped the offending member with both hands.

"You hang onto the lines, Lois, and give 'em a good jerk the minute I loosen up his tail."

The subsequent failure of this attempt deflected the malicious Dolly still further from the path of duty. A wheel cramped and lifted perilously.

Miss Daggett squealed shrilly:

"He'll tip the buggy over--he'll tip the buggy over! For pity's sake, Abby!"

Mrs. Daggett stepped briskly out of the vehicle and seized the bridle.

"Ain't you ashamed?" she demanded sternly. "You loosen up that there tail o' yourn this minute!"

"I got 'em!" announced Miss Daggett, triumphantly. "He loosened right up."

She handed the recovered reins to her sister-in-law, and the two ladies resumed their journey and their conversation.

"I never was so scared in all my life," stated Lois Daggett, straightening her hat which had assumed a rakish angle over one ear. "I should think you'd be afraid to drive such a horse, Abby. What in creation would have happened to you if I hadn't been in the buggy?"

"As like as not he wouldn't have took a notion with his tail, Lois, if I'd been driving him alone," hazarded Mrs. Daggett mildly. "Dolly's an awful knowing horse.... Git-ap, Dolly!"

"Do you mean to tell me, Abby Daggett, that there horse of Henry's has took a spite against _me?_" demanded the spinster.... "Mebbe he's a mind-reader," she added darkly.

"You know I didn't mean nothin' like that, Lois," her sister-in-law assured her pacifically. "What I meant to say was: I got so interested in what you were saying, Lois, that I handled the reins careless, and he took advantage.... Git-ap, Dolly! Don't you see, Lois, even a horse knows the difference when two ladies is talking."

"You'd ought to learn to say exactly what you mean, Abby," commented Miss Daggett.

She glanced suspiciously at the fresh striped muslin, which was further enhanced by a wide crocheted collar and a light blue satin bow.

"Where'd you say you were goin' this afternoon, Abby?"

"I said out in the country a piece, Lois; it's such a nice afternoon."

"Well, _I_ should think Henry'd be needing the horse for his business. I know _I'd_ never think of asking him for it--and me a blood relation, too, trying to earn my bread and butter tramping around the country with Famous People."

Mrs. Daggett, thus convicted of heartless selfishness, sighed vaguely. Henry's sister always made her feel vastly uncomfortable, even sinful.

"You know, Lois, we'd be real glad to have you come and live with us constant," she said heroically.... "Git-ap, Dolly!"

Miss Daggett compressed her thin lips.

"No; I'm too independent for that, Abby, an' you know it. If poor Henry was to be left a widower, I might consider living in his house and doing for him; but you know, Abby, there's very few houses big enough for two women.... And that r'minds me; did you know Miss Orr has got a hired girl?"

"Has she?" inquired Mrs. Daggett, welcoming the change of subject with cordial interest. "A hired girl! ...Git-ap, Dolly!"

"Yes," confirmed Miss Daggett. "Lute Parsons was telling me she came in on th' noon train yesterday. She brought a trunk with her, and her check was from Boston."

"Well, I want to know!" murmured Mrs. Daggett. "Boston's where _she_ came from, ain't it? It'll be real pleasant for her to have somebody from Boston right in the house.... G'long, Dolly!"

"I don't know why you should be so sure of that, Abby," sniffed Miss Daggett. "I should think a person from right here in Brookville would be more company. How can a hired girl from Boston view the passin' and tell her who's goin' by? I think it's a ridiculous idea, myself."

"I shouldn't wonder if it's somebody she knows," surmised Mrs. Daggett. "'Twould be real pleasant for her to have a hired girl that's mebbe worked for her folks."

"I intend to ask her, if she comes to the door," stated Lois Daggett. "You can drop me right at the gate; and if you ain't going too far with your buggy-riding, Abby, you might stop and take me up a spell later. It's pretty warm to walk far today."

"Well, I was thinkin' mebbe I'd stop in there, too, Lois," said Mrs. Daggett apologetically. "I ain't been to see Miss Orr for quite a spell, and--"

The spinster turned and fixed a scornfully, intelligent gaze upon the mild, rosy countenance of her sister-in-law.

"Oh, _I see!_" she sniffed. "That was where you was pointing for, all the while! And you didn't let on to me, oh, no!"

"Now, Lois, don't you get excited," exhorted Mrs. Daggett. "It was just about the wall papers. Henry, he says to me this mornin'--... Git-ap, Dolly!"

_"'Henry says--Henry says'!_ Yes; I guess so! What do you know about wall papers, Abby? ...Well, all I got to say is: I don't want nobody looking on an' interfering when I'm trying to sell 'Lives of Famous People.' Folks, es a rule, ain't so interested in anything they got to pay out money fer, an' I want a clear field."

"I won't say a word till you're all through talkin', Lois," promised Mrs. Daggett meekly. "Mebbe she'd kind of hate to say 'no' before me. She's took a real liking to Henry.... Git-ap, Dolly.... And anyway, she's awful generous. I could say, kind of careless; 'If I was you, I'd take a leather-bound.' Couldn't I, Lois?"

"Well, you can come in, Abby, if you're so terrible anxious," relented Miss Daggett. "You might tell her, you and Henry was going to take a leather-bound; that might have some effect. I remember once I sold three Famous People in a row in one street. There couldn't one o' them women endure to think of her next door neighbor having something she didn't have."

"That's so, Lois," beamed Mrs. Daggett. "The most of folks is about like that. Why, I rec'lect once, Henry brought me up a red-handled broom from th' store. My! it wa'n't no time b'fore he was cleaned right out of red-handled brooms. Nobody wanted 'em natural color, striped, or blue. Henry, he says to me, 'What did you do to advertise them red-handled brooms, Abby?' 'Why, papa,' says I, 'I swept off my stoop and the front walk a couple of times, that's all.' 'Well,' he says, 'broom-handles is as catching as measles, if you only get 'em th' right color!' ... Git-ap, Dolly!"

"Well, did you _ever!_" breathed Miss Daggett excitedly, leaning out of the buggy to gaze upon the scene of activity displayed on the further side of the freshly-pruned hedge which divided Miss Lydia Orr's property from the road: "Painters and carpenters and masons, all going at once! And ain't that Jim Dodge out there in the side yard talking to her? 'Tis, as sure as I'm alive! I wonder what _he's_ doing? Go right in, Abby!"

"I kind of hate to drive Dolly in on that fresh gravel," hesitated Mrs. Daggett. "He's so heavy on his feet he'll muss it all up. Mebbe I'd better hitch out in front."

"She sees us, Abby; go on in!" commanded Miss Daggett masterfully. "I guess when it comes to that, her gravel ain't any better than other folks' gravel."

Thus urged, Mrs. Daggett guided the sulky brown horse between the big stone gateposts and brought him to a standstill under the somewhat pretentious _porte-cochere_ of the Bolton house.

Lydia Orr was beside the vehicle in a moment, her face bright with welcoming smiles.

"Dear Mrs. Daggett," she said, "I'm so glad you've come. I've been wanting to see you all day. I'm sure you can tell me--"

"You've met my husband's sister, Miss Lois Daggett, haven't you, Miss Orr? She's the lady that made that beautiful drawn-in mat you bought at the fair."

Miss Orr shook hands cordially with the author of the drawn-in mat.

"Come right in," she said. "You'll want to see what we're doing inside, though nothing is finished yet."

She led the way to a small room off the library, its long French windows opening on a balcony.

"This room used to be a kind of a den, they tell me; so I've made it into one, the first thing, you see."

There was a rug on the floor, a chair or two and a high mahogany desk which gave the place a semblance of comfort amid the general confusion. Miss Lois Daggett gazed about with argus-eyed curiosity.

"I don't know as I was ever in this room, when Andrew Bolton lived here," she observed, "but it looks real homelike now."

"Poor man! I often think of him," said kindly Mrs. Daggett. "'Twould be turrible to be shut away from the sunshine f'r even one year; but poor Andrew Bolton's been closed up in State's prison fer--l' me see, it mus' be goin' on--"

"It's fifteen years, come fall, since he got his sentence," stated the spinster. "His time must be 'most up."

Lydia Orr had seated herself in an old-fashioned chair, its tall carved back turned to the open windows.

"Did you--lose much in the bank failure, Miss Daggett?" she inquired, after a slight pause, during which the promoter of Famous People was loosening the strings of her black silk bag.

"About two hundred dollars I'd saved up," replied Miss Daggett. "By now it would be a lot more--with the interest."

"Yes, of course," assented their hostess; "one should always think of interest in connection with savings."

She appeared to be gazing rather attentively at the leather-bound prospectus Miss Daggett had withdrawn from her bag.

"That looks like something interesting, Miss Daggett," she volunteered.

"This volume I'm holdin' in my hand," began that lady, professionally, "is one of the most remarkable works ever issued by the press of any country. It is the life history of one thousand men and women of world-wide fame and reputation, in letters, art, science _an'_ public life. No library nor parlor table is complete without this authoritative work of general information _an'_ reference. It is a com-plete library in itself, and--"

"What is the price of the work, Miss Daggett?" inquired Lydia Orr.

"Just hold on a minute; I'm coming to that," said Miss Daggett firmly. "As I was telling you, this work is a complete library in itself. A careful perusal of the specimen pages will convince the most skeptical. Turning to page four hundred and fifty-six, we read:--"

[Illustration: "Just hold on a minute; I'm coming to that," said Miss Daggett firmly.]

"I'm sure I should like to buy the book, Miss Daggett."

"You ain't th' only one," said the agent. "Any person of even the most ordinary intelligence ought to own this work. Turning to page four hundred and fifty-six, we read: 'Snipeley, Samuel Bangs: lawyer ligislator _an'_ author; born eighteen hundred fifty-nine, in the town of--'"

At this moment the door was pushed noiselessly open, and a tall, spare woman of middle age stood upon the threshold bearing a tray in her hands. On the tray were set forth silver tea things, flanked by thin bread and butter and a generous pile of sponge cake.

"You must be tired and thirsty after your drive," said Lydia Orr hospitably. "You may set the tray here, Martha."

The maid complied.

"Of course I must have that book, Miss Daggett," their hostess went on. "You didn't mention the title, nor the price. Won't you have a cup of tea, Mrs. Daggett?"

"That cup of tea looks real nice; but I'm afraid you've gone to a lot of trouble and put yourself out," protested Mrs. Daggett, who had not ventured to open her lips until then. What wonderful long words Lois had used; and how convincing had been her manner. Mrs. Daggett had resolved that "Lives of Famous People," in its best red leather binding, should adorn her own parlor table in the near future, if she could persuade Henry to consent.

"I think that book Lois is canvassing for is just lovely," she added artfully, as she helped herself to cake. "I'm awful anxious to own one; just think, I'd never even heard of Snipeley Samuel Bangs--"

Lois Daggett crowed with laughter.

"Fer pity sake, Abby! don't you know no better than that? It's Samuel Bangs Snipeley; he was County Judge, the author of 'Platform Pearls,' and was returned to legislature four times by his constituents, besides being--"

"Could you spare me five copies of the book, Miss Daggett?" inquired Lydia, handing her the sponge cake.

"Five copies!"

Miss Daggett swiftly controlled her agitation.

"I haven't told you the price, yet. You'd want one of them leather-bound, wouldn't you? They come high, but they wear real well, and I will say there's nothing handsomer for a parlor table."

"I want them all leather-bound," said Lydia, smiling. "I want one for myself, one for a library and the other three--"

"There's nothing neater for a Christmas or birthday present!" shrilled Lois Daggett joyously. "And so informing."

She swallowed her tea in short, swift gulps; her faded eyes shone. Inwardly she was striving to compute the agent's profit on five leather-bound copies of Famous People. She almost said aloud "I can have a new dress!"

"We've been thinking," Lydia Orr said composedly, "that it might be pleasant to open a library and reading room in the village. What do you think of the idea, Miss Daggett? You seem interested in books, and I thought possibly you might like to take charge of the work."

"Who, me?-- Take charge of a library?"

Lois Daggett's eyes became on the instant watchful and suspicious. Lydia Orr had encountered that look before, on the faces of men and even of boys. Everybody was afraid of being cheated, she thought. Was this just in Brookville, and because of the misdeeds of one man, so long ago?

"Of course we shall have to talk it over some other day, when we have more time," she said gently.

"Wouldn't that be nice!" said Mrs. Daggett. "I was in a library once, over to Grenoble. Even school children were coming in constant to get books. But I never thought we could have one in Brookville. Where could we have it, my dear?"

"Yes; that's the trouble," chimed in Lois. "There isn't any place fit for anything like that in our town."

Lydia glanced appealingly from one to the other of the two faces. One might have thought her irresolute--or even afraid of their verdict.

"I had thought," she said slowly, "of buying the old Bolton bank building. It has not been used for anything, Judge Fulsom says, since--"

"No; it ain't," acquiesced Mrs. Daggett soberly, "not since--"

She fell silent, thinking of the dreadful winter after the bank failure, when scarlet fever raged among the impoverished homes.

"There's been some talk, off and on, of opening a store there," chimed in Lois Daggett, setting down her cup with a clash; "but I guess nobody'd patronize it. Folks don't forget so easy."

"But it's a good substantial building," Lydia went on, her eyes resting on Mrs. Daggett's broad, rosy face, which still wore that unwonted look of pain and sadness. "It seems a pity not to change the--the associations. The library and reading room could be on the first floor; and on the second, perhaps, a town hall, where--"

"For the land sake!" ejaculated Lois Daggett; "you cer'nly have got an imagination, Miss Orr. I haven't heard that town hall idea spoken of since Andrew Bolton's time. He was always talking about town improvements; wanted a town hall and courses of lectures, and a fountain playing in a park and a fire-engine, and the land knows what. He was a great hand to talk, Andrew Bolton was. And you see how he turned out!"

"And mebbe he'd have done all those nice things for Brookville, Lois, if his speculations had turned out different," said Mrs. Daggett, charitably. "I always thought Andrew Bolton _meant_ all right. Of course he had to invest our savings; banks always do, Henry says."

"I don't know anything about _investing_, and don't want to, either--not the kind he did, anyhow," retorted Lois Daggett.

She arose as she spoke, brushing the crumbs of sponge cake from her skirt.

"I got to get that order right in," she said: "five copies--or was it six, you said?"

"I think I could use six," murmured Lydia.

"And all leather-bound! Well, now, I know you won't ever be sorry. It's one of those works any intelligent person would be proud to own."

"I'm sure it is," said the girl gently.

She turned to Mrs. Daggett.

"Can't you stay awhile longer? I--I should like--"

"Oh, I guess Abby'd better come right along with me," put in Lois briskly ... "and that reminds me, do you want to pay something down on that order? As a general thing, where I take a big order--"

"Of course--I'd forgotten; I always prefer to pay in advance."

The girl opened the tall desk and producing a roll of bills told off the price of her order into Miss Daggett's hand.

"I should think you'd be almost afraid to keep so much ready money by you, with all those men workin' outside," she commented.

"They're all Brookville men," said Lydia. "I have to have money to pay them with. Besides, I have Martha."

"You mean your hired girl, I suppose," inferred Miss Daggett, rubbing her nose thoughtfully.

"She isn't exactly--a servant," hesitated Lydia. "We give the men their noon meal," she added. "Martha helps me with that."

"You give them their dinner! Well, I never! Did you hear that, Abby? She gives them their dinner. Didn't you know men-folks generally bring their noonings in a pail? Land! I don't know how you get hearty victuals enough for all those men. Where do they eat?"

"In the new barn," said Lydia, smiling. "We have a cook stove out there."

"Ain't that just lovely!" beamed Mrs. Daggett, squeezing the girl's slim hand in both her own. "Most folks wouldn't go to the trouble of doing anything so nice. No wonder they're hustling."

"Mebbe they won't hustle so fast toward the end of the job," said Lois Daggett. "You'll find men-folks are always ready to take advantage of any kind of foolishness. Come, Abby; we must be going. You'll get those books in about two weeks, Miss Orr. A big order takes more time, I always tell people."

"Thank you, Miss Daggett. But wouldn't you--if you are in a hurry, you know; Mr. Dodge is going to the village in the automobile; we're expecting some supplies for the house. He'll be glad to take you."

"Who, Jim Dodge? You don't mean to tell me Jim Dodge can drive an auto! I never stepped foot inside of one of those contraptions. But I don't know but I might's well die for a sheep as a lamb."

Lois Daggett followed the girl from the room in a flutter of joyous excitement.

"You can come home when you get ready, Abby," she said over her shoulder. "But you want to be careful driving that horse of yours; he might cut up something scandalous if he was to meet an auto." _

Read next: Chapter 10

Read previous: Chapter 8

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