Janice Day at Poketown Part 15

Before Aunt 'Mira and Marty were up, the pump was working in fine style. Uncle Jason had taken an abundance of water out to the cattle.

Usually the drinking trough was filled but once a day, and that about noon. Now the poor horses and the neglected cow could have plenty of water.

And so could the household. Aunt 'Mira need no longer give things "a lick and a promise," as she so frequently expressed it. When she came down it was to a humming fire, a steaming kettle, and a br.i.m.m.i.n.g pail on the shelf.

"I declare for't, Janice!" she exclaimed. "What you done now?"

"Nothing, Aunty--save to put a pretty bunch of lilacs on the table for you."

"An' them lilacs is always fragrant," agreed the lady. "Who went for the water? Is Marty up?"

"Marty wouldn't lose his beauty sleep," laughed Janice.

"For the mercy's sake!" gasped Aunt 'Mira. "The pump bench is wet. I declare for't! Jason never fixed that pump, did he?"

"Just try it, Aunty!" cried the delighted Janice. "See how easy it works! And the more it's pumped the better the water will be. It's not quite clear yet, you know. Moss _will_ grow in the pipe."

"Janice, you're a wonder! You kin do more with your uncle than his own fam'bly can, an' that's a fact!"

"I hope you don't mind, Aunty?" she whispered, coming over to the large lady and hugging her. "You know, after all, it's for you he did it."

"Wal, it does lighten my labor, that's a fact," admitted Aunt 'Mira.

"He use ter do a-many things for me, years ago. Oh, yes! Your Uncle Jason warn't allus like he is now. But we got kinder in a rut I 'xpec'. An' I ain't young and good-lookin' like I use ter be, an' that makes a diff'rence with a man."

"_I_ think you're very pleasant to look at, Aunt 'Mira," declared the girl, warmly. "And I don't believe Uncle Jason ever saw a girl he liked to look at so well as you. Of course not!"

"But I be gittin' old," sighed the poor woman. "An' I ain't got a decent gown to put on no more. An' I'm _fat_."

Janice still hugged her. "We'll just overhaul your wardrobe, you and I, Aunty, and I believe we can find something that can be fixed over to look nice. You'd ought to wear pretty gowns--of course you had. Let's surprise Uncle Jason by dressing you up. Why, he hasn't seen you dressed up since--since I've been here."

"Longer'n that, child--much longer'n that," admitted Aunt 'Mira, shamefacedly. "P'r'aps _'tis_ my fault. Anyway, I'm glad about the pump," and she kissed her niece, heartily.

CHAPTER XI

A RAINY DAY

Janice had learned that there were at least two senses left to Hopewell Drugg's unfortunate child that connected her with the world as it is, and with her fellow creatures. As she gradually had lost her sight and hearing, and, consequently, speech was more and more difficult for her, Lottie's sense of touch and of smell were being sharpened.

Her olfactory nerves were almost as keen as a dog's. How she loved the scent of flowers! She named many of the blossoms in the gardens about just by the odor wafted to her upon the air. And she was really a pretty sight, sitting upon the shady porch of her father's store, sorting and making into bouquets the flowers that neighbors gave her.

The old-fas.h.i.+oned shrubs and flowers in the Day yard were in bloom now in abundance, and one morning before school Janice carried to little Lottie a huge armful of odorous blossoms. It was a "dripping" morning.

As yet it had not rained hard; but just as Janice turned off High Street toward the store, the heavens opened and the rain fell in torrents.

She ran laughing to the porch of the Drugg's store. For once the man was at the front, and he welcomed her with his polite, storekeeper's smile, and the natural courtesy which was usual with him. Janice remembered how the carping Mrs. Scattergood had declared that Hopewell Drugg would be "polite to a stray cat!"

"You must not go farther in this rain, Miss Janice," he said. "Do come in. Miss 'Rill went along to school half an hour ago--or she never would have gotten there without a wetting. Are these for little Lottie? How kind of you!"

"She's a dear, and she loves flowers so," replied Janice, brightly. "I _will_ come in out of the rain, if you don't mind, Mr. Drugg."

"Yes. The roof of the porch leaks a little. I--I ought to fix that,"

said the storekeeper, feebly.

He followed his visitor in, and as his fiddle lay on the counter near at hand, he took it up. He was playing softly an old, old tune, when Janice came back through the pa.s.sage from the house. She had found Lottie in the kitchen, and had left her, delighted with the posies, sitting at the table to make them up into bouquets.

The rain was pouring down with no promise of a let-up, and Janice did not have even an umbrella. She took off her coat and hung her hat to dry on the back of a chair.

"I shall have to be company for a while, I expect, Mr. Drugg," she said, laughing.

"You are more than welcome, Miss Janice," returned the storekeeper, as he put down his instrument again. "Is the child all right?"

"She will be busy there for an hour, I think," declared Janice.

"I--I am afraid I shall scarcely know how to entertain you. Miss,"

said Drugg, hesitatingly. "We have little company. I--I have a few books----"

"Oh, my, Mr. Drugg! you mustn't think of entertaining me," cried the girl, cheerfully. "You have your own work to do--and customers to serve----"

"Not many in this rain," he told her, smiling faintly.

"Why, no--I suppose not. But don't you have orders to put up? I supposed a storekeeper was a very busy man."

"I am not that kind of a storekeeper, I am afraid," returned Hopewell Drugg, shaking his head. "I have few customers now. Only a handful of people come in during the day. You see, I am on the side street here.

We owned this property--mother and I. Mother was bedridden. I thought it would be easier to keep store and wait on her back in the house there, than to do most things; so I got into this line. It--it barely makes us a living," and he sighed.

"But you _do_ have some business?"

"Oh, yes. Old customers who know my stock is always first-cla.s.s come to me regularly,--especially out-of-town people. Sat.u.r.days I manage to have quite some trade, like the Hammett Twins, and the farmers. I can't complain."

"You never liked the business, then?" asked Janice, shrewdly.

"No. Not that it isn't as good as most livelihoods. We all must work.

And I never could do the thing I _loved_ to do. Not with mother bedridden."

"And that thing was?" asked Janice.

He touched the violin on the counter softly. "I had just music enough in me to be mad for it," he said, and his gray face suddenly colored faintly, for it evidently cost him something to speak so frankly.

"Mother did not approve--exactly. You see, my father was a music teacher, and he never--well--'made good', as the term is now. So mother did not approve. This was father's violin--fiddle 'most folks call it. But it is very mellow and sweet--if I had only been taught properly to play it. You see, father died before I was born."

Out of these few sentences, spoken so gently, Janice swiftly built, in her quick mind, the whole story of the man. His had been a life of repression--perhaps of sacrifice! The soul of music in the man had never been able to burst its chrysalis.

"Mother died after I was of age. It seemed too late then for me to get into any other business," Hopewell Drugg went on to say, evenly. "You know, Miss, one gets into a rut. I was in a rut then. And we hadn't any too much money left. It was quite necessary that I do something to keep the pot a-boiling. There wasn't enough money left for music lessons, and all that.

"And then----"

He stopped. A queer look came over his face, and somehow the alert girl beside him knew what he was thinking of. 'Rill Scattergood was in his mind. He must have thought a great deal of the little school-mistress at one time--before he had married that other girl.

Aunt Almira had said he had married 'Cinda Stone "out of spite!" Was it so?