Mary-'Gusta Part 61

Mr. Chase drew himself up. "If I hove out such a statement as that," he observed, scornfully, "you'd call me a fool. 'If my head come off!' How could I notice anything if my head was off? You tell me that!"

His employer grinned. "I cal'late you could do it about as well as you can with it on, Isaiah," he said, and walked away, leaving the cook and steward incoherently anxious to retort but lacking ammunition.

So Shadrach was obliged to give up the riddle. Lovers' quarrels were by no means unusual, he knew that, and many young love affairs came to nothing. Mary had never told him that she cared for Crawford. But she had never said she did not care for him. And now she would say nothing except that it was "done with forever." The Captain shook his head and longed for Zoeth's counsel and advice. But Zoeth would not be able to counsel or advise for months.

And now Mary seemed bent upon proving the truth of her statement that she was henceforth to be solely a business woman. The summer being over--and it had been, everything considered, a successful one for Hamilton and Company--it became time to buy fall and winter goods, also goods for the holidays. Mary went to Boston on a buying expedition. When she returned and informed her uncle what and how much she had bought, he looked almost as if he had been listening to the reading of his death warrant.

"Jumpin' Judas!" he exclaimed. "You don't mean to tell me you bought all them things and--and got TRUSTED for 'em?"

"Of course I did, Uncle Shad. It is the only way I could buy them; and, so far as that goes, everyone was glad to sell me. You see, our paying our bills up there in a shorter time than I asked for has made a very good impression. I could have bought ever and ever so much more if I had thought it best."

"Jumpin' fire! Well, I'm glad you didn't think it best. What in the nation we're goin' to do with all we have got I don't see."

"Do with it? Why, sell it, of course."

"Urn--yes, I cal'lated that was the idea, probably; but who's goin' to buy it?"

"Oh, lots of people. You'll see. I am going to advertise this fall, advertise in the papers. Oh, we'll make Baker's Bazaar and the rest worry a little before we're through."

The Captain was inclined to fear that the most of the worrying would be done by Hamilton and Company, but he expressed no more misgivings.

Besides, if anyone could sell all those goods, that one was his Mary-'Gusta, he was perfectly sure of that. He believed her quite capable of performing almost any miracle. Had she not pulled the firm off the rocks where he and his partner had almost wrecked it? Wasn't she the most wonderful young woman on earth? Old as he was, Captain Shad would probably have attempted to thrash any person who expressed a doubt of that.

And the goods were sold, all of them and more. The advertis.e.m.e.nts, temptingly worded, appeared in the county weeklies, and circulars were sent through the mails. Partly by enterprise and partly through influence--Mr. Keith helped here--Mary attained for Hamilton and Company the contract for supplying the furniture and draperies for the new hotel which a New York syndicate was building at Orham Neck. It was purely a commission deal, of course--everything was purchased in Boston--and Hamilton and Company's profit was a percentage, but even a small percentage on so large a sale made a respectable figure on a check and helped to pay more of the firm's debts. And those debts, the old ones, were now reduced to an almost negligible quant.i.ty.

The secondhand horse and wagon still continued to go upon their rounds, but the boy had been replaced by an active young fellow whose name was Crocker and who was capable of taking orders as well as delivering them.

When Captain Shadrach was told--not consulted concerning but told--the wages this young man was to receive, he was, as he confided to Isaiah afterward, "dismasted, stove in, down by the head and sinkin' fast."

"Mary-'Gusta Lathrop!" he cried, in amazement. "Are you goin' stark loony? Payin' that Simmie Crocker fourteen dollars a WEEK for drivin'

team and swappin' our good sugar and flour for sewin'-circle lies over folks' back fences! I never heard such a thing in my life. Why, Baker's Bazaar don't pay the man on their team but ten a week. I know that 'cause he told me so himself. And Baker's Bazaar's got more trade than we have."

"Yes. And that is exactly why we need a better man than they have, so that WE can get more trade. Simeon Crocker is an ambitious young chap.

He isn't going to be contented with fourteen long."

"Oh, he ain't, eh? Well, I ain't contented with it now, I tell you that.

Fourteen dollars a week for drivin' cart! Jumpin' fire! Why, the cart itself ain't worth more'n fifteen and for twenty-five I'd heave in the horse for good measure. But I'd never get the chance," he added, "unless I could make the trade in the dark."

Mary laughed and patted his shoulder.

"Never mind, Uncle Shad," she said, confidently, "Sim Crocker at fourteen a week is a good investment. He will get us a lot of new business now, and next summer--well, I have some plans of my own for next summer."

The Christmas business was very good indeed. Shadrach, Mary, Annabel, and Simeon were kept busy. Customers came, not only from South Harniss, but from West and East Harniss and even from Orham and Bayport. The newspaper advertis.e.m.e.nts were responsible for this in the beginning, but those who first came told others that the best stock of Christmas goods in Ostable County was to be found at the store of Hamilton and Company, in South Harniss, and so the indirect, word-of-mouth advertising, which is the best and most convincing kind, spread and brought results.

Christmas itself was a rather dreary day. Zoeth, although improving, was not yet strong enough to leave his room, and so the Christmas dinner lacked his presence at the table. Mary and Shadrach sat with him for an hour or so, but the doctor and nurse had cautioned them against exciting him, so, although the Captain joked continually, his jokes were rather fickle and in his mind was his partner's prophecy of two years before--that the tide which had, up to that time, been coming in for them, would soon begin to go out. Shadrach could not help feeling that it had been going out, for poor Zoeth at any rate. The doctor declared it was coming in again, but how slowly it came! And how far would it come? This was the first Christmas dinner he had eaten in years without seeing Mr. Hamilton's kindly, patient face at the other side of the table.

And Mary, although she tried to appear gay and lighthearted, laughing at her uncle's jokes and attempting a few of her own, was far from happy.

Work, Captain Shad's recipe for producing forgetfulness, had helped, but it had not cured. And when, as on a holiday like this, or at night after she had gone to bed, there was no work to occupy her mind, she remembered only too well. Crawford had written her, as he promised, after his return home. He wrote that he and his father were reconciled and that he had resumed his studies. The letter was brave and cheerful, there was not a hint of whining or complaint in it. Mary was proud of him, proud of his courage and self-restraint. She could read between the lines and the loneliness and hopelessness were there but he had done his best to conceal them for her sake. If he felt resentment toward her, he did not show it. Lonely and hopeless as she herself was, her heart went out to him, but she did not repent her decision. It was better, ever and ever so much better, as it was. He would forget and be happy by and by, and would never know his father's shameful story. And poor Uncle Zoeth would never know, either. As for her--well, she must work, work harder than ever. Thank G.o.d there were six working days in the week!

She did not answer that letter. After much deliberation she fought down the temptation and decided not to do so. What was the use? If one wished to forget, or wished someone else to forget, if it was a real wish and not merely pretending, the way to bring about that result was to do nothing to cause remembrance. Letters, even the letters of friends, the most platonic letters, were reminders. She had begged for Crawford's friends.h.i.+p--she could not bring herself to let him go without hearing that he forgave her and would think of her as a friend--but now she vowed she would not be so silly and childish as to torture him or herself unnecessarily. She would not do it. And so she did not write.

After Christmas came the long, dull winter. It was the most discouraging season the silent partner of Hamilton and Company had yet put in in her capacity as manager. There were no cottagers to help out with their custom, very few new customers, no fresh faces in the store, the same dreary, deadly round from morning till night. She tried her hardest and, with the able a.s.sistance of Sim Crocker who was proving himself a treasure, did succeed in making February's sales larger than January's and those of March larger than either. But she looked forward to April and the real spring with impatience. She had a plan for the spring.

It was in March that she experienced a great satisfaction and gave Shadrach the surprise and delight of his life by collecting the firm's bill against Mr. Jeremiah Clifford. Mr. Clifford, it will be remembered, had owed Hamilton and Company one hundred and ten dollars for a long time. There was every indication that he was perfectly satisfied with the arrangement and intended to owe it forever. Mary had written, had called upon him repeatedly, had even journeyed to Ostable and consulted her friend Judge Baxter. The Judge had promised to look into the matter and he did so, but his letter to her contained little that was hopeful.

There is money there [wrote the Judge]. The man Clifford appears to be in very comfortable circ.u.mstances, but he is a shrewd [there were indications here that the word "rascal" had been written and then erased] person and, so far as I can learn, there is not a single item of property, real or otherwise, that is in his own name. If there were, we might attach that property for your debt, but we cannot attach Mrs.

Clifford's holdings. All I can advise is to discontinue selling him more goods and to worry him all you can about the old bill. He may grow tired of being dunned and pay, if not all, at least something on account.

When Mary read this portion of the letter to her Uncle Shadrach his scorn was outspoken.

"Get tired!" he scoffed. "Jerry Clifford get tired of bein' dunned!

DON'T talk so foolis.h.!.+ Why, he gets fat on that kind of thing; it's the main excitement he has, that and spendin' a cent twice a day for newspapers. Did you ever watch Jerry buy a paper? No? Well, you go up to Ellis's some day when the mornin' papers are put out for sale and watch him. He'll drive up to the door with that old hoopskirt of a horse of his--that's what the critter looks like, one of them old-fas.h.i.+oned hoop-skirts; there was nothin' to them but framework and a hollow inside, and that's all there is to that horse.--Well, Jerry he'll drive up and come in to the paper counter, his eyes s.h.i.+nin' and his nerves all keyed up and one hand shoved down into his britches pocket. He'll stand and look over the papers on the counter, readin' as much of every one as he can for nothin', and then by and by that hand'll come out of his pocket with a cent in it. Then the other hand'll reach over and get hold of the paper he's cal'latin' to buy, get a good clove hitch onto it, and then for a minute he'll stand there lookin' first at the cent and then at the paper and rubbin' the money between his finger and thumb--he's figgerin' to have a little of the copper smell left on his hand even if he has to let go of the coin, you see--and--"

Mary laughed.

"Uncle Shad," she exclaimed, "what ridiculous nonsense you do talk!"

"No nonsense about it. It's dead serious. It ain't any joke to Jerry, you can bet on that. Well, after a spell, he kind of gets his s.p.u.n.k up to make the plunge, as you might say, lays down the penny--Oh, he never throws it down; he wouldn't treat real money as disrespectful as that--grabs up the paper and makes a break for outdoors, never once lookin' back for fear he might change his mind. When he drives off in his buggy you can see that he's all het up and trembly, like one of them reckless Wall Street speculators you read about. He's spent a cent, but he's had a lovely nerve-wrackin' time doin' it. Oh, a feller has to satisfy his cravin' for excitement somehow, and Jerry satisfies his buyin' one-cent newspapers and seein' his creditors get mad. Do you suppose you can worry such a critter as that by talkin' to him about what he owes? Might as well try to worry a codfish by leanin' over the rail of the boat and hollerin' to it that it's drownin'."

Mary laughed again. "I'm afraid you may be right, Uncle Shad," she said, "but I shan't give up hope. My chance may come some day, if I wait and watch for it."

It came unexpectedly and in a rather odd manner. One raw, windy March afternoon she was very much surprised to see Sam Keith walk into the store. Sam, since his graduation from college, was, as he expressed it, "moaning on the bar" in Boston--that is to say, he was attending the Harvard Law School with the hope, on his parents' part, that he might ultimately become a lawyer.

"Why, Sam!" exclaimed Mary. "Is this you?"

Sam grinned cheerfully. "'Tis I," he declared. "I am here. That is to say, the handsome youth whose footfalls you hear approaching upon horseback is none other than our hero. Mary, you are, as usual, a sight to be thankful for. How do you do?"

Mary admitted that she was in good health and then demanded to know what he was doing down on the Cape at that time of the year. He sat down in a chair by the stove and propped his feet against the hearth before replying.

"Why! Haven't you guessed?" he asked, in mock amazement. "Dear me! I'm surprised. I should have thought the weather would have suggested my errand. Hear that zephyr; doesn't it suggest bathing suits and outing flannels and mosquitoes and hammock flirtations? Eh?"

The zephyr was a sixty-mile-an-hour March gale. Sam replied to his own question.

"Answer," he said, "it does not. Right, my child; go up head. But, honest Injun, I am down here on summer business. That Mr. Raymond, Dad's friend, who was visiting us this summer is crazy about the Cape. He has decided to build a summer home here at South Harniss, and the first requisite being land to build it on he has asked Dad to buy the strip between our own property and the North Inlet, always provided it can be bought. Dad asked me to come down here and see about it, so here I am."

Mary considered. "Oh, yes," she said, after a moment, "I know the land you mean. Who owns it?"

"That's what I didn't know," said Sam. "But I do know now. I asked the first person I met after I got off the train and oddly enough he turned out to be the owner himself. It was old Clifford--Isaiah, Elisha, Hosea--Jeremiah, that's it. I knew it was one of the prophets."

"So Mr. Clifford owns that land. I didn't know that."

"Neither did I. He didn't tell me at first that he did own it. Asked me what I wanted to know for."

"Did you tell him?" asked Mary.

For the first time since Mr. Keith's arrival that young gentleman's easy a.s.surance seemed a little shaken. He appeared to feel rather foolish.

"Why, yes, to be honest, I did," he admitted. "I was an idiot, I suppose, but everyone asks about everyone's else business down here and I didn't think. He kept talking and pumping and before I realized it I told him about Raymond's being so anxious to get that property, being dead set on it and all that, and about my being commissioned to buy at any reasonable figure. And then, after a while, he astonished me by saying he owned the land himself. Confound it! I suppose he'll jam the price away up after what I told him."