The Smiling Hill-Top Part 5

I blush to state that I selected a younger chauffeur! Emboldened by the success of my first advertising venture, I decided to try again. This time I wished to sell our superfluous old furniture. The war has made me dislike anything about the place that isn't really in use. Having lived some years in Pennsylvania, and having ama.s.sed quite a collection of antique mahogany furniture, I felt justified in thinning out a few tables and odd pieces that our desirable bungalow is too small to hold.

The results weren't as p.r.o.nounced as before, but they quite repaid me. I sold my best table to a general, which gave me a lot of confidence, but my greatest triumph was a hat-rack. It was a barren, gaunt-looking affair, like a leafless tree in winter, but it was mahogany, and it was old. Two ladies who were excitedly buying tables spied it, and exclaimed in rapture. I rose to the occasion:

"That is the most unusual piece I have," I unblus.h.i.+ngly gushed. "It is solid mahogany and very old. I never saw another like it. Yes, I would sell it for twenty-five dollars."

They both wanted it--I was almost afraid it might make feeling between them, till I soothed the loser by selling her an old bra.s.s tea-kettle that I had picked up in a curiosity shop in Oxford years ago. It was so old that it had a hole in it, which seemed to clinch the matter. I sent for the packer the moment they were out of the house, and had the things boxed and away before they could change their minds. When I showed J---- the money, he said I was wasting my time writing, that he was sure I had a larger destiny.

Speaking of having furniture boxed carries me back to the time when we lived in Pennsylvania and I bought many things of a pleasant old rascal who just managed to keep out of jail. One time he showed me a lovely old table of that ruddy glowing mahogany that adds so much to a room. I said I would take it, but told him not to send it home till afternoon. I wanted time to break it to J---- after a good luncheon. J---- was very amiable and approving, and urged me to have it sent up, so I went down to the shop to see about it. To my dismay I found it neatly crated and just being loaded into a wagon. I called frantically to my rascally friend, who tried to slip out of the back door un.o.bserved, but in vain.

I fixed him with an accusing eye.

"What are you doing with my table?" I demanded.

"Did you really want it?" he queried.

"Of course I want it. Didn't I say I'd take it?" I was annoyed.

"Oh, well," to his men, "take it off, boys." "You see," turning to me, "a man from Seattle was in after you left, and he said he'd take that round table over there if I'd sell him this one too. I showed him another one every bit as good as this, but he wouldn't look at it; still, I guess I'll box it up in that crate with his round one, and when it gets to Seattle I reckon he won't want to send it way back. It's a long way to Seattle!"

"That's your business, not mine," I remarked coldly, though I felt an unholy desire to laugh. "Just send mine home before any one else tempts you."

I still sleep in a Hepplewhite four-poster that he wheedled out of an old Pennsylvania Dutch woman for a mere song. The posts at the head were sawed off so that the bed could stand in a room with a sloping ceiling, but, fortunately, the thrifty owner had saved the pieces instead of using them for firewood, so I have had them neatly stuck on again.

I think perhaps a subconscious recollection of his methods was what made me so successful with the hat-rack.

War work has brought out much latent ability of this kind. Lilies of the field, who had never needed to toil or spin for themselves, were glad to do so for the Red Cross. In Pasadena we had a small Spanish street (inside a building), with tiny shops on either side, where you could buy anything from an oil painting to a summer hat. In front was a gay little plaza with vines and a fountain, where lunch and tea were served by the prettiest girls in town in bewitching frilled caps with long black streamers and sheer lawn ap.r.o.ns over blue and green frocks. The Tired Business Men declined to lunch anywhere else, and there was a moment when we feared it might have to be given up, as there was some feeling in town on account of the vacant stools at their old-time counters! It all went to prove that you don't need to be brought up in "trade" to be a great success at it.

No one has stuck to his or her usual role in the past two years, which has added a piquancy to life. We have all wanted to do our bit and the "Why not?" that I feel so strongly in California has spread over the whole country. In order to make the most efficient use of the newly discovered talents on every side, the Red Cross sent out cards with blanks to be filled by all those ready to work, asking what they felt themselves fitted to do, when could they work, and how long. One card read "willing but nervous, might possibly pray."

Our Red Cross Street brought in many people full of enthusiasm and energy, who might never have rolled a bandage. I shan't soon forget the strenuous days of its opening. J---- and another diplomat, who also has a talent for pouring oil on troubled waters, were in charge of the financial part of the enterprise, and theirs was the task of seeing that none of the chapter funds were used, so that no possible criticism could arise. A pretty young actress offered to give a premiere of a comedy which she was about to take on the road, for the benefit of the street, and every one was delighted until they saw a rehearsal. It was one of those estranged-husband-one-c.o.c.ktail-too-many farces, full of innuendo and profanity. J---- and his partner were much upset, but it was too late to withdraw. The company, in deference to the Red Cross, agreed to leave out everything but the plain d.a.m.ns. Even then it wasn't what they would have chosen, and two very depressed "angels" met in the hall of the High School Auditorium, on the night of the performance. Nothing had gone right. The tickets were late coming from the printer, the advertising man had had tonsilitis, every one was "fed up" with Red Cross entertainments, and it was pouring in torrents. There was a sprinkling of gallant souls on the first floor of the big hall, and that was all. The fact that they wouldn't make much money wasn't what was agitating the "angels" nearly as much as the wrath of the pink-and-white lady about to appear. Then came the inspiration. I wish I could say it was J----'s idea, but it was Mr. M----'s. A night school of several hundred is in session in that building every evening, and a cordial invitation to see a play free brought the whole four hundred in a body to fill the auditorium, if not completely, at least creditably. They loved it and were loud in their applause. The "d.a.m.ns" didn't bother them a bit. They encored the lady, which, combined with a mammoth bouquet, provided by the "management," gave the whole thing quite a triumphant air. When we all went behind the scenes after the play, the atmosphere was really balmy. The lady expressed herself as greatly pleased and gratified by so large and enthusiastic an audience. ("On such a bad night, too!") I retired behind a bit of scenery and pinched myself till I felt less hilarious. One thing I know, and that is that if J---- should ever change his business it won't be to go into any theatrical enterprise. I don't think even the "movies" could lure him, and yet she was a very pretty actress!

It is a far cry from blonde stars to funerals, but J---- feels no change of subject, however abrupt, is out of place when talking of his "first night," so I would like to say a few words about that branch of California business. In the first place, no one ever dies out here until they are over eighty, unless they are run over or meet with some other accident. J---- says that old ladies in the seventies, driving electrics, are the worst menace to life that we have. When our four-score years and ten have been lived--probably a few extra for good measure--an end must come, but a California funeral is so different! A Los Angeles paper advertises "Perfect Funerals at Trust Prices." We often meet them bowling gayly along the boulevards, the motor hea.r.s.e maintaining a lively pace, which the mourners are expected to follow.

The nearest J---- ever came to an accident was suddenly meeting one on the wrong side of the road, and the funeral chauffeur's language was not any more scriptural than J----'s. As we were nowhere near eighty, we felt we had a lot of life still coming to us and gave grateful thanks for our escape.

Life is a good thing. I maintain it in the face of pessimists, but it is a particularly good thing in California, with its suns.h.i.+ne and its possibilities. I shan't go on because I believe I have said something of this same sort before. It makes you ready for the next thing, whatever that may be, and you feel pretty sure that it will be interesting. It's a kind of perpetual "night before Christmas" feeling. Some time ago when I picked up my evening paper my eye fell on this advertis.e.m.e.nt:

"Wanted: A third partner in a well-established trading business in the South Seas. Schooner now fitting out in San Francisco to visit the Islands for cargo of copra, pearls, sandalwood, spices, etc. Woman of forty or over would be considered for clerical side of enterprise, with headquarters on one of the islands. This is a strictly business proposition--no one with sentiment need apply."

When I read it first I couldn't believe it. I rubbed my eyes and read it again. There it was next to the Belgian hares, the bargains in orange groves and the rebuilt automobiles. It was fairly reeking with romance.

I felt like finding an understudy for my job at home, boarding the schooner and sailing blithely out of the Golden Gate. The South Seas is the next stop beyond Southern California. I think I could keep their old books, though I never took any prizes in arithmetic at school. How amusing it would be to enter in my ledger instead of "two dozen eggs"

and "three pounds of b.u.t.ter," "two dozen pearls at so much a dozen" (or would they be entered by ounces?) and "fifty pounds of sandalwood," or should I reckon that by cords? I could find out later. I would wear my large tortoise-sh.e.l.l spectacles (possibly blinders in addition), and I should attend strictly to business for a while, but when a full moon rose over a South Sea lagoon, and the palm trees rustled and the phosph.o.r.escence broke in silver on the bow of the pearl schooner, where she rode at anchor in our little bay, could I keep my contract and avoid sentiment? How ridiculous to suppose that stipulating that the lady should be forty or over would make any difference! What is forty? If they had said that she must be a cross-eyed spinster with a hare-lip, it would have been more to the point. I'm not a spinster or cross-eyed, but why go on? I don't intend to commit myself about the age limit. I don't have to, because I am not going to apply for the position, after all. I have a South Sea temperament but as it is securely yoked to a New England upbringing, the trade wind will only blow the sails of my imagination to that sandalwood port.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

SUNKIST

We saw a most amusing farce some time ago which contained much interesting information concerning the worth of advertising. I forget the fabulous figure at which "The Gold Dust Twins" trade-mark is valued, but I know that it easily puts them into Charley Chaplin's cla.s.s. I am sure that "Sunkist" cannot be far behind the "Twins," for no single word could possibly suggest a more luscious, delectable, and desirable fruit than that. It would even take the curse off being a lemon to be a "Sunkist" lemon. It contains no hint of the perilous early life of an orange. Truly that life is more chancey than an aviator's. They say that in the good old days there were no frosts, but that irrigation is gradually changing the climate of Southern California. We would not dare to express an opinion on this much discussed point, as we have never gone to any new place where the climate has been able to stand the shock. It is always an unusual season. I do know, however, that bringing up a crop of oranges is as anxious an undertaking as "raising" a family.

Little black smudge pots stand in rows in the groves, ready to be lighted at the first hint of frost. The admonition of the hymn applies to fruit growers as well as to foolish virgins:

"See that your lamps are burning, Your vessels filled with oil."

On sharp mornings the valleys are full of a gray haze still lingering protectingly over the ranches. Then there are blights. I don't pretend to know all the ills the orange is heir to. Sometimes it grows too fat and juicy and cracks its skin, and sometimes it is attacked by scale.

Every tree has to be swathed in a voluminous sheet and fumigated once a year at great expense. After living out here some time, I began to understand why even in the heart of the orange country we sometimes pay fifty cents a dozen for the large fruit. There is a way, however, of getting around the high cost of living in this particular--you can go to a packing house and buy for thirty-five cents an entire box of what are called culls--oranges too large or too small for s.h.i.+pping, or with some slight imperfection that would not stand transportation, but are as good for most purposes as the "Sunkist" themselves.

In California, Orange Day is next in importance to Was.h.i.+ngton's Birthday and the Fourth of July. I shall never forget our first experience of its charms. We were motoring, taking a last jaunt in an old machine which we had just sold for more than we ever had expected to get for it. It was a reckless thing to do, for we had no spare tire and it is very like speculating in oil stocks to start for a run of any length under those circ.u.mstances. It worked out about as it would have done if we had been trifling with the stock market. A rear tire blew out, and we were put under the disagreeable necessity of giving our purchaser more nearly his money's worth. This was a poor start for a holiday, but being near a delightful inn, we crept slowly to town on our rim and found a fete awaiting us. We also found friends from the East who asked us all to lunch, thereby, as one member of the party put it in Pollyanna's true spirit, much decreasing the price of the new tire. The inn is built in Spanish style and we lunched in a courtyard full of gaudy parrots, singing birds in wicker cages and singing senoritas as gay as the parrots, on balconies above us. The entire menu was orange, or at least colored orange. It was really charming, and our spirits rose to almost a champagne pitch, though orange juice--diluted at that--was the only beverage served. (I believe that there is a Raisin Day, also, but on account of its horrid a.s.sociation with rice and bread puddings we have let that slip by unnoticed.)

Our California color scheme is the very latest thing in decorative art.

There is nothing shrinking about us, for we come boldly forth in orange and yellows in true cigar-ribbon style--even our motor licenses of last year had poppies on them. Speaking of poppies, I heard the other day of a lady who voiced her opinion in all seriousness in the paper, that Mr.

Hoover should have California poppy seeds sent to him for distribution among the Belgians to sow over the ruins of their country. Of course there is something in the power of suggestion, and I suppose it would brighten up the landscape. Joedy is strong on the color idea. We had a neighbor who had a terrible attack of jaundice, which turned her the color of a daffodil. I was saying what a pity it was, then Joedy observed: "Well, Muvs, I think she makes a nice bright spot of color!"

There is a road leading toward the San Fernando Valley, with fruit stalls on both sides, very gay with oranges, grape-fruit, and lemons.

One particularly alluring stand is presided over by a colored mammy in bandana shades, turban and all.

All this profusion makes one feel that it is no trick to get a living out of this very impulsive soil, but before buying a plot of one's own, it is wise to see the seasons through. California is a very unexpected country. You see a snug little ranch, good soil, near a railroad, just what you were looking for, but three months of the year it may be under water. After the spring rains we once went for a change of air to one of the beaches, which we particularly disliked, because it was the only place that we could get to, bridges being out in all directions. For the same reason it was so packed with other visitors, maybe as unwilling as we, that we had a choice of sleeping in the park or taking a small apartment belonging to a Papa and Mama Dane. It was full of green plush and calla lilies, but we chose it in preference to the green gra.s.s and calla lilies of the park. We pa.s.sed an uneasy and foggy week there. I slept in a bed which disappeared into a bureau and J---- on a lounge that curled up like a jelly roll by day. Mama Dane gave us breakfast in the family sitting-room where a placard hung, saying, "G.o.d hears all that you say." J---- and I took no chances, and ate in silence. Anyway, the eggs were fresh. We explored the country as well as we could in the fog, and found quite a large part of it well under water. On one ranch we met a morose gentleman in hip boots, wading about his property, which looked like a pretty lake with an R. F. D. box sticking up here and there like a float on a fis.h.i.+ng line, while a gay party of boys and girls were rowing through an avenue of pepper trees in an old boat. The gentleman in the hip boots had bought his place in summer! J---- and I decided then and there that if we ever bought any property in California, it would be in the midst of the spring rains, but we know now that even that wouldn't be safe--another element has to be reckoned with besides water--fire.

Of course Rain in California is spelled with a capital R. Noah spelled it that way, but we didn't before we came West. It swells the streams, which in summer are nothing but trickles, to rus.h.i.+ng torrents in no time. Bridges snap like twigs, dams burst, telegraph lines collapse; rivers even change their courses entirely, if they feel like it, so that it would really be a good idea to build extra bridges wherever it seemed that a temperamental river might decide to go. I have heard of a farmer who wrote to one of the railroads, saying, "Will you please come and take your bridge away from my bean-field? I want to begin ploughing."

This adds natural hazards to the real-estate game. There are others--Fire, as I said a moment ago. I have a very profound respect for the elements since we have come West to live. A forest fire is even more terrifying than a flood, and in spite of the eagle eyes of the foresters many are the lovely green slopes burned over each year. I have seen a brush fire marching over a hill across the canyon from us, like an army with banners--flying our colors of orange and yellow--driving terrified rabbits and snakes ahead of it, and fought with the fervor of Crusaders by the property owners in its path.

The very impulsiveness of the climate seems to give the most wonderful results in the way of vegetables and fruit. Around Pasadena there are acres and acres of truck gardens, developed with j.a.panese efficiency. I love al fresco marketing. If I can find time once a week to motor up the valley and fill the machine with beautiful, crisp, fresh green things of all kinds, it makes housekeeping a pleasure. The little j.a.panese women are so smiling and pleasant, with their "Good-by, come gen," the melons are so luscious, the eternal strawberry so ripe and red, the orange blossom honey so delectable, and everything is so cheap compared to what we had been used to in the East! I think that in San Diego one can live better on a small income than anywhere in the country. Once some intimate friends of ours gave us a dinner there in January that could not have been surpa.s.sed in New York. The menu included all the delicacies in season and out of season, fresh mushrooms, alligator pears and pheasants. J---- and I looked at one another in mingled enjoyment and dismay that so much was being done for us. Finally our host could not help telling us how much for each person this wonderful meal was costing, including some very fetching drinks called "pink skirts." You wouldn't believe me if I told how little!

One more delicacy of which we make rather a specialty: I should call it a climate sandwich. If you live in the invigorating air of the foothills, to motor to the sea, a run of some thirty miles from where we live in winter, spend several hours on the sand, and before dark turn "Home to Our Mountains" gives a mountain air sandwich with sea-breeze filling--a singularly refres.h.i.+ng and satisfying dainty.

Perhaps my enthusiasm for California sounds a little like cupboard love.

There is a certain type of magazine which publishes the most alluring pictures of food, salads and desserts, even a table with the implements laid out ready for canning peaches, that holds a fatal fascination for me. I have even noticed J---- looking at one with interest. When my father comes out to visit us every spring, the truck gardens, the packing houses, and the cost of living here, I think, affect him in much the same way that those magazines do me, and I wonder if every one, except a dyspeptic, doesn't secretly like to hear and see these very things! Could it be the reason people used to paint so much still life?--baskets of fruit, a hunter's game-bag, a divided melon, etc. I frankly own that they would thrill me more if I knew their market price, so that I might be imagining what delightful meals I could offer my family without straining the household purse, which is my excuse for the intimate details concerning food and prices which I have given.

Surely human beings ought to respond as the fruits do to this climate, in spirit as well as in body, and become a very mellow, amiable, sweet-tempered lot of people, and I think they do. Even the "culls" are almost as good as the rest, though they won't bear transportation. It is the land of the second chance, of dreams come true, of freshness and opportunity, of the wideness of out-of-doors--"Sunkist!"

THE END