Dear Enemy Part 12

April 24.

Dear Jervis Pendleton, Esq.:

This is to supplement a night telegram which I sent you ten minutes ago. Fifty words not being enough to convey any idea of my emotions, I herewith add a thousand.

As you will know by the time you receive this, I have discharged the farmer, and he has refused to be discharged. Being twice the size of me, I can't lug him to the gate and chuck him out. He wants a notification from the president of the board of trustees written in vigorous language on official paper in typewriting. So, dear president of the board of trustees, kindly supply all of this at your earliest convenience.

Here follows the history of the case:

The winter season still being with us when I arrived and farming activities at a low ebb, I have heretofore paid little attention to Robert Sterry except to note on two occasions that his pigpens needed cleaning; but today I sent for him to come and consult with me in regard to spring planting.

Sterry came, as requested, and seated himself at ease in my office with his hat upon his head. I suggested as tactfully as might be that he remove it, an entirely necessary request, as little orphan boys were in and out on errands, and "hats off in the house" is our first rule in masculine deportment.

Sterry complied with my request, and stiffened himself to be against whatever I might desire.

I proceeded to the subject in hand, namely, that the diet of the John Grier Home in the year to come is to consist less exclusively of potatoes. At which our farmer grunted in the manner of the Hon. Cyrus Wykoff, only it was a less ethereal and gentlemanly grunt than a trustee permits himself. I enumerated corn and beans and onions and peas and tomatoes and beets and carrots and turnips as desirable subst.i.tutes.

Sterry observed that if potatoes and cabbages was good enough for him, he guessed they was good enough for charity children.

I proceeded imperturbably to say that the two-acre potato field was to be plowed and fertilized, and laid out into sixty individual gardens, the boys a.s.sisting in the work.

At that Sterry exploded. The two-acre field was the most fertile and valuable piece of earth on the whole place. He guessed if I was to break that up into play gardens for the children to mess about in, I'd be hearing about it pretty danged quick from the board of trustees. That field was fitted for potatoes, it had always raised potatoes, and it was going to continue to raise them just as long as he had anything to say about it.

"You have nothing whatever to say about it," I amiably replied. "I have decided that the two-acre field is the best plot to use for the children's gardens, and you and the potatoes will have to give way."

Whereupon he rose in a storm of bucolic wrath, and said he'd be gol darned if he'd have a lot of these danged city brats interfering with his work.

I explained--very calmly for a red-haired person with Irish forebears--that this place was run for the exclusive benefit of these children; that the children were not here to be exploited for the benefit of the place, a philosophy which he did not grasp, though my fancy city language had a slightly dampening effect. I added that what I required in a farmer was the ability and patience to instruct the boys in gardening and simple outdoor work; that I wished a man of large sympathies whose example would be an inspiring influence to these children of the city streets.

Sterry, pacing about like a caged woodchuck, launched into a tirade about silly Sunday-school notions, and, by a transition which I did not grasp, pa.s.sed to a review of the general subject of woman's suffrage.

I gathered that he is not in favor of the movement. I let him argue himself quiet, then I handed him a check for his wages, and told him to vacate the tenant house by twelve o'clock next Wednesday.

Sterry says he'll be danged if he will. (Excuse so many DANGEDS. It is the creature's only adjective.) He was engaged to work for this inst.i.tution by the president of the board of trustees, and he will not move from that house until the president of the board of trustees tells him to go. I don't think poor Sterry realizes that since his arrival a new president has come to the throne.

ALORS you have the story. I make no threats, but Sterry or McBride--take your choice, dear sir.

I am also about to write to the head of the Ma.s.sachusetts Agricultural College, at Amherst, asking him to recommend a good, practical man with a nice, efficient, cheerful wife, who will take the entire care of our modest domain of seventeen acres, and who will be a man with the right personality to place over our boys.

If we get the farming end of this inst.i.tution into running shape, it ought to furnish not only beans and onions for the table, but education for our hands and brains.

I remain, sir, Yours most truly, S. McBRIDE, Superintendent of the John Grier Home.

P.S. I think that Sterry will probably come back some night and throw rocks through the windows. Shall I have them insured?

My dear Enemy:

You disappeared so quickly this afternoon that I had no chance to thank you, but the echoes of that discharge penetrated as far as my library.

Also, I have viewed the debris. What on earth did you do to poor Sterry?

Watching the purposeful set of your shoulders as you strode toward the carriage house, I was filled with sudden compunction. I did not want the man murdered, merely reasoned with. I am afraid you were a little harsh.

However, your technic seems to have been effective. Report says that he has telephoned for a moving wagon and that Mrs. Sterry is even now on her hands and knees ripping up the parlor carpet.

For this relief much thanks.

SALLIE McBRIDE.

April 26.

Dear Jervis:

Your vigorous telegram was, after all, not needed. Dr. Robin MacRae, who is a grand PAWKY mon when it comes to a fight, accomplished the business with beautiful directness. I was so bubbling with rage that immediately after writing to you I called up the doctor on the telephone, and rehea.r.s.ed the whole business over again. Now, our Sandy, whatever his failings (and he has them), does have an uncommon supply of common sense. He knows how useful those gardens are going to be, and how worse than useless Sterry was. Also says he, "The superintendent's authority must be upheld." (That, incidentally, is beautiful, coming from him.) But anyway, those were his words. And he hung up the receiver, cranked up his car, and flew up here at lawless speed. He marched straight to Sterry, impelled by a fine Scotch rage, and he discharged the man with such vigor and precision, that the carriage house window was shattered to fragments.

Since this morning at eleven, when Sterry's wagonload of furniture rumbled out of the gates, a sweet peace has reigned over the J. G. H.

A man from the village is helping us out while we hopefully await the farmer of our dreams.

I am sorry to have troubled you with our troubles. Tell Judy that she owes me a letter, and won't hear from until she has paid it. Your ob'd't servant,

S. McBRIDE.

Dear Judy:

In my letter of yesterday to Jervis I forgotted (Punch's word) to convey to you our thanks for three tin bathtubs. The skyblue tub with poppies on the side adds a particularly bright note to the nursery. I do love presents for the babies that are too big to be swallowed.

You will be pleased to hear that our manual training is well under way.

The carpenter benches are being installed in the old primary room, and until our schoolhouse gets its new addition, our primary cla.s.s is meeting on the front porch, in accordance with Miss Matthew's able suggestion.

The girls' sewing cla.s.ses are also in progress. A circle of benches under the copper beech tree accommodates the hand sewers, while the big girls take turns at our three machines. Just as soon as they gain some proficiency we will begin the glorious work of redressing the inst.i.tution. I know you think I'm slow, but it's really a task to accomplish one hundred and eighty new frocks. And the girls will appreciate them so much more if they do the work themselves.

I may also report that our hygiene system has risen to a high level. Dr.

MacRae has introduced morning and evening exercises, and a gla.s.s of milk and a game of tag in the middle of school hours. He has inst.i.tuted a physiology cla.s.s, and has separated the children into small groups, so that they may come to his house, where he has a manikin that comes apart and shows all its messy insides. They can now rattle off scientific truths about their little digestions as fluently as Mother Goose rhymes.

We are really becoming too intelligent for recognition. You would never guess that we were orphans to hear us talk; we are quite like Boston children.

2 P.M.

O Judy, such a calamity! Do you remember several weeks ago I told you about placing out a nice little girl in a nice family home where I hoped she would be adopted? It was a kind Christian family living in a pleasant country village, the foster-father a deacon in the church.

Hattie was a sweet, obedient, housewifely little body, and it looked as though we had exactly fitted them to each other. My dear, she was returned this morning for STEALING. Scandal piled on scandal: SHE HAD STOLEN A COMMUNION CUP FROM CHURCH!

Between her sobs and their accusations it took me half an hour to gather the truth. It seems that the church they attend is very modern and hygienic, like our doctor, and has introduced individual communion cups.

Poor little Hattie had never heard of communion in her life. In fact, she wasn't very used to church, Sunday-school having always sufficed for her simple religious needs. But in her new home she attended both, and one day, to her pleased surprise, they served refreshments. But they skipped her. She made no comment, however; she is used to being skipped.

But as they were starting home she saw that the little silver cup had been casually left in the seat, and supposing that it was a souvenir that you could take if you wished, she put it into her pocket.