The Wide Awake Girls in Winsted Part 2

"We must find a good place for it, before we get many books collected.

We could use Father's twenty-five dollars for rent, of course, but it would be so much nicer if some one would give us a room."

"Let me see. There's that little frame shop where the red-haired milliner used to be. We might get that. It's no good for business, away off up the street that way."

"Be careful what you say about red hair," warned Catherine. "Who owns the building?"

"Judge Arthur. He's a public-spirited man. He'll let us have it cheap anyway."

"Good! O, I am so happy and excited about it I feel like one of Hannah Eldred's squeals; I'm afraid if she were here I'd join her in one. Here we are at Miss Ainsworth's. Are you sure we dare ask her?"

Before the prim white house set back from the street, Catherine's buoyancy suffered a collapse. She had been inside that house, calling, with her mother, but to go there--or anywhere--on a begging errand! Here Algernon's long familiarity with rebuffs proved of value.

[Ill.u.s.tration: "'We must find a good place for it.'"--_Page 17._]

"Of course, we dare. Come on, or I'll go alone if you don't want to."

"No, no, I'll come," Catherine answered hastily. She had counted, without conceit, on her own popularity to offset Algernon's handicap.

The daughter of the Doctors Smith could not be turned coldly away. And after all, Miss Ainsworth's novels might better be read than standing idle. Two years ago, a young bicyclist had sprained an ankle at Miss Ainsworth's door, and she had promptly taken him in and cared for him, scornfully refusing pay. Therefore the youth, upon returning to his home, had sent out to her a great box full of modern fiction, an article which he had deeply and vainly desired while under her roof. Miss Ainsworth had never been given to the reading of novels. Her life had been quite too busy for such frivolities, and now her eyes were making it impossible for her to read without using gla.s.ses, which, as a confession of frailty, she despised. So the books stood, new and unopened, in a fascinating row upon the "secretary" shelf. No one so far had ventured to ask for them. It had been reserved for these young adventurers to demand them in the name of public spirit.

"We will have your name put inside them, Miss Ainsworth, on a neat little card,--'Gift of Miss Anna Ainsworth,' you know. Just as they do in large libraries," Catherine explained persuasively, when Algernon had stated the object of their call, and Miss Ainsworth was regarding them in a silence which they took to be ominous.

"And your name will go down in the records with Dr. Smith's as one of the first contributors to the library. We intend to keep very full records and have them buried under the corner stone of the new building when we get it. We hope to get a Carnegie building, you know," Algernon went on calmly while Catherine caught her breath. "He always insists that the townspeople do their share."

"The young people will use the library if we have good novels,"

Catherine put in helpfully, when Algernon's imagination showed signs of exhaustion. "And then we can get them to reading more serious books by and by."

Then Catherine too, subsided, and the clock behind its painted gla.s.s door ticked obtrusively. Presently Miss Ainsworth opened her thin lips.

"I'm perfectly willin' 't you should have the books," she said grimly.

"They ain't no manner o' use to me, and never was. I don't care to have my name wrote inside 'em, though. And I ain't perticular about havin' it buried under any corner stones. But I'll be much obliged if you'll take 'em away soon, for I've just subscribed to a set of me-mores of missionaries an agent was sellin' yesterday, and I'd like that top shelf to put 'em on."

The enthusiasts, feeling a trifle quenched, but yet pleased at having accomplished their purpose, rose and withdrew with what grace they could summon, mingling thanks with promises to remove the undesired literature as soon as possible.

"Now for Judge Arthur and the building," sighed Catherine, as they reached the street again. "He can't be any more gloomy about it than she was, and maybe he'll do what we want."

The judge was not in his office, so they sat down to wait in the stuffy room where dusty books and papers sprawled and spilled over desk, table and the top of a big black safe. Algernon attached himself to a grimy magazine, having first jotted down Miss Ainsworth's gift in his ever-present note-book. Catherine, looking about her, soon found herself unable to restrain her housewifely fingers. She was busily sweeping the dust off the big table with a dilapidated feather duster, and putting the papers into trim piles when the door opened and Judge Arthur, little and weazened and gray, slipped softly in.

"There!" said Catherine half aloud. "That is infinitely better. I wish I dared throw half of these papers away. I know they're perfectly worthless." She took a step toward the big wire basket, as though to bring it conveniently near.

"Not to-day, Miss Catherine," and the judge took her hand and bowed over it. "Is this what they teach you at college?"

Catherine laughed. She had never been afraid of Judge Arthur.

"They teach us all the womanly graces, Your Honor," she answered, "and not least among them is tidiness. I should have had you looking beautifully neat in another five minutes."

Judge Arthur s.h.i.+vered. "And you would doubtless have made a bonfire of this," picking up one dog's-eared doc.u.ment, "old Mr. Witherton's will; and this, a deed to an estate; and this, a bit of important evidence in a criminal case."

"Well," Catherine argued, "they shouldn't be left about so carelessly, under paper-weights and ash-trays. I do want to do some housecleaning for you, Judge Arthur. That's why I'm here this afternoon. Not just an office, either, but a whole building."

The judge placed a chair for her, dusting it elaborately with Mr.

Witherton's will as he did so.

"Tell me all about it," he invited.

Catherine took the chair, her fresh white gown contrasting as sharply with its shabby leather as her warm youth did with the judge's withered look. He watched her with keen, appreciating eyes. Algernon in his corner read on, and Catherine thought best not to disturb him. Men found it harder to meet Algernon on fair ground than women did.

The judge asked a pertinent question or two as Catherine unfolded the great scheme; then he drew a check-book from under a broken-backed dictionary.

"There is another twenty-five for your project," he said, as he signed his name with a flourish surprisingly big for so cramped a little man; "and the room is at your disposal for six months, rent free. I would have it cleaned, but you seem to delight in doing such work yourself. I can a.s.sure you that the Three R's will back you up. The next meeting is called for a week from to-day."

Catherine's face wore its blithest smile. "You are a dear to do so much," she declared. "I was sure you'd be interested. If you ever want any cleaning done, _anywhere_, please let me do it!"

Algernon had to be aroused almost forcibly, and Catherine carried him away, still so lost in the article on the jury system he had been reading that he could not quite take in the wonderful success of the call. He followed Catherine's eager steps to the little square frame building a few blocks up Main Street, and turned the key she gave him.

It was a dingy little room, all dirt and cobwebs. A few old straw hats and wire frames piled among some big green boxes indicated the last occupant's business, and a scurrying of tiny feet, only too clearly, the present occupants' nature. Catherine lifted her nose in dainty scorn, and her skirts in private apprehension.

"We shall have to get a lot of girls and come down here to-morrow and clean up; but let's get out for now," she said, and Algernon consented.

They strolled along the street till they came to the little park, and there, sitting on its one green bench, talked over their list of a.s.sets.

"I keep having ideas all the time," cried Catherine. "Listen! We must go over to Hampton and visit the library there, and find out how they do things. When can you?"

"Any time. I was just thinking I must ask Mr. Morse to give us a good write-up."

"Of course. He'll be interested. Let's go over now. Or perhaps you'd better go alone. I don't know him, and I never was in a newspaper office."

"Afraid of the devil?" jested Algernon, getting up and leaving her.

Catherine watched him disappear into the office across the street.

"He walks better already," she thought with pride. "And he never made such a frivolous remark as that before. I do think this library will be the making of Algernon."

Back he came in a minute or two, with a promise of plenty of s.p.a.ce in the _Courier_, and a free atlas.

"One they had in the office, of course; but we ought to have one, and every little helps. He was awfully interested and said it would be a fine thing for the town, and he'd boost every way he could."

"Aren't people lovely?" sighed Catherine rapturously. "I believe even Miss Ainsworth was more enthusiastic than she appeared to be. And we haven't even mentioned it to the Boat Club yet."

"Or the Three R's. They are chiefly Boat Club fathers and mothers."

"We must see the school superintendent."

"The ministers will announce it in the churches."

"Yes, we must see them to-morrow. O dear, I am so tired! What time is it anyway?"

Algernon drew a big watch from his pocket.

"Six-fifteen."