The Man Next Door Part 21

"I know," says Bonnie Bell. "In any pack train there always had to be one old gray critter, with the bell."

"That's it!" says Katherine. "Well now, all these leaders of our best people they want to carry the bell and go on ahead. That's what Mrs.

Wisner wants--and maybe mommah, though she has a different way of doing things. Mommah's a dear! So are you, Honey; and I do wish Tom and you----"

"I was just wondering who it was got out of their car just now," says Bonnie Bell. "But the fence----"

"Ain't the ivy pretty on your side of your fence?" says Katherine.

Bonnie Bell stood in front of her and looked at her square.

"Look here, Kitty Kimberly, you're as sweet as can be and I love you, but don't try to keep up the bluff about that fence. They built it to keep us--to keep us----"

"Well, maybe," says Katherine. "But they can't."

"They built it to show us our place," says Bonnie Bell, brave as you like. "They didn't think that--they didn't know----"

"It was cruel," says Katherine, red in her face now, she was so mad about it. "I'm glad you mentioned that fence--I couldn't; but all my people said it was the meanest thing ever done. It was vulgar! It was low! That's what my mommah says. We were always sorry for you, but we didn't know how---- But, Honey, I'm glad you planted the ivy on it. It shows you're forgiving."

"We're not," says Bonnie Bell. "We're far from it--at least my dad. He's awful when you cross him. He won't quit--he'll never quit!"

"We all know that," says Katherine. "Everybody in the Row does."

"I don't know how much you know," says Bonnie Bell. "I don't know how much people have talked about us."

"Well, I can tell you one thing," says Katherine. "We heard some of the talk; and I want to say that it isn't favorable to the Wisners. There are others in town besides them. Tell me, Honey, aren't you all the way American?"

"Yes," says Bonnie Bell. "I can be a Daughter of the Revolution and a Colonial Dame, and a Patriot Son, and all the rest, so far as having ancestors is concerned."

"Could you?" says Katherine. "Then I rather guess you will!"

"We go back to the Carrolls a good deal, in Maryland," says Bonnie Bell.

"You see, my mother married my father and went West, and out there we didn't pay much attention to such things. I didn't know they cared so much here. But my people were first settlers and builders, and always in the army and navy."

"How perfectly dear!" says Katherine. "We'll start you in as a Daughter; that'll make Old Lady Wisner mad, but she can't help it--mommah will take care of that. Then we'll make you a Dame next--that'll help things along. And when you're in two or three more of these Colonial businesses, where the Wisners can't get--well, then I'll be more comfortable, for one.

"I don't blame your poppah for feeling savage towards the Wisners," says she after a while. "Who're the Wisners anyways? Carrolls--huh! I guess that's about as good as coming from Iowa and carrying your dinner in a pail while you're getting your start selling sausage casings in a basket. I don't think a packer's much nohow. We're in leather.

"But, good-by," says she now. "I've got to go home. I've got to tell mommah to get those papers started. Pretty soon I'll bring Tom over."

Nothing much happened around our place for a little while. I didn't see n.o.body from the Wisners' and I didn't care to. Kind of from force of habit I used to walk up and down the line fence once in a while, just to have a eye on it. I done that one evening and walked back towards our garridge, for it seemed to me I heard some sort of noise down that way.

It wasn't far from the end of the wall that was close to the lake. I set down and waited. It seemed to me like someone was trying to break a hole through the wall. I could hear it plunk, plunk, like someone was using a chisel or crowbar, soft and easy, like he didn't want to be heard. I waited to see what would happen.

By and by I seen a brick fall out on our side of the wall. I just picked it up and set there waiting to bust in the head of anybody that come through after the brick if he couldn't explain what he was about.

The fellow on the other side kept on working. He pulled bricks out on his side now. By and by I could see light through--it wasn't right dark in the yard yet. He pulled out the bricks and made quite a little hole close to the ground.

"h.e.l.lo there!" says he, soft like. "Is that you, Curly?" says he.

"Who're you and what do you want?" says I.

"I am the hired man, Jimmie," says he. "I've come back."

"The h.e.l.l you have!" says I. "Well, I can't talk to you. What made you come back? Where you been?"

"Out West," says he, "on the Circle Arrow Ranch."

"What's that!" says I. "What do you mean?"

"Just what I said. I've been working out there. I found I could rope a little and I didn't always fall off a horse. You see, the old man owns a lot in that company."

"Why didn't you tell me you was going out there?" says I. "And how come these folks to take you back?"

"They couldn't help it," he says. "I told you I had too much on them.

You'd ought to see how things is going out there! They had to take me back."

"Well, what are you breaking a hole in our fence for?" says I. "Quit it!

Do you want to get buried in a sunk garden, instead of on the lone prairee? Leave our fence alone."

"Your fence? It's our fence. Don't I know all about it? It was a d.a.m.n shame, Curly."

"What business is it of yours?" says I to him.

"Well, I hate to see the family I work for make such fools of theirselfs." He was setting up close to the wall now, looking through.

He went on talking: "If I put the bricks in again on my side, and you on yours, who'll know the hole's there?"

"We've got ivy on our side," says I. "It's green and 'most to the top of the wall. But I don't know now why you broke that hole through."

"Curly," says he, "I want to let Peanut through, so's he can have a good friendly fight with my dog once in a while. Sometimes I'll pull some of the bricks out. I reckon Peanut'll do the rest."

"Peanut'll not do no more visiting," says I; "and I've got orders not to have any sort of truck with anyone on your side of the fence."

He set quite a while quiet, and then says he:

"Is that so, Curly?" says he.

"It certainly is," I answered him. "When a thing starts, till it's settled you can't stop Old Man Wright. Sometimes he pays funeral expenses," says I, "but when anybody gets on the prod with him I never saw him show no sign of beginning to quit. He can't," says I; "none of them Wrights can."

"Do you mean they're all that way, Curly?"

"The whole kit of 'em, me included," says I, "and the servants within our gate, and our ox, and our hired girl, and all our hired men."

"Even the maidservant within your gates?" ast he of me.

"Sh.o.r.e!" says I. "Her especial and worst of any."

"But you don't take no hand in this war?" says he.

"That's just what I do," says I to him. "That's what a foreman's for.