Idle Hour Stories Part 10

"Pot calling the kettle black!" was the saucy fling from a chorus of school-girls who were enjoying their first seaside vacation.

"Now, grandma," exclaimed the parlor maid to a beautiful old lady with silver hair, "you shall have a big chair right in the middle of the dining hall, and be manager-in-chief."

Meanwhile the landlord had been overcome.

"Ladies," he now managed to articulate, and certainly he meant it, "I don't know what to say; I don't know how to thank you. But I know what I'll do; I'll turn away the last one of those quarrelsome blacks; root and branch they shall go. I'm tired of living in bedlam. I shall go down at once and start them; then I'll telegraph to New York and take the first train out. Rest a.s.sured I shall be back to your relief as soon as possible."

The proprietor had made himself heard in the confusion, and as he left the parlor hearty cheers followed him, when immediately the groups of talkers broke out again into plans and promises.

"Organize! Organize!" thundered a big man who had been jostled from his morning paper. "There can be no success without system."

"Hear! Hear!" roared the fun-loving fellows. "Down with the crowd to the lower regions! Come on with your const.i.tution and by-laws! Hold fast to law and order! Give us liberty, or death--pumpkin pies and lily-white hands! Hurrah! On to the kitchen!"

With mock circ.u.mspection they were forcing couples to pair off; but the level-headed matrons soon arranged matters more to the purpose.

The various branches of work were a.s.signed to willing hands that only awaited the signal for action.

Great was the consternation of the mutineers when the "boss" appeared in the dismantled kitchen and ordered them all off the premises. In vain they protested, laying the blame on first one and then another. Their day of grace was ended and no quarter shown. Wilfully and from sheer love of bickering, they had offended all sense of justice and propriety, and in unbroken ranks they must go.

When the fiat had irretrievably gone forth, they showed again the claws and the cloven foot. The "cook-lady" said she "didn't hafter work nohow;" she reckoned she could "git along." The maids and the waiters took the cue and were equally independent. But though paid their wages in full, they were discharged without "a recommend"; and this, in the height of the season, was no small privation.

"Teach them a lesson!" muttered the proprietor with satisfaction.

"Serves them right! I'm rather glad of the row."

Cheerily the guests fell to work in their several departments, and if more than one match for life was not made among the young people, it was from no lack of genuine admiration in their new roles. The lads and la.s.sies were happy and rosy and busy at their self-appointed tasks.

The white-coated waiters were dubbed "No. 47," "No. 50," and so on, and right n.o.bly they served the well-spread tables, which lacked nothing, not even the boon of contentment, which so helps digestion.

The flushed matrons behind big kitchen ap.r.o.ns, with diamonds locked away in the hotel safe, took turns to perfection. Many guests took their ease, and were mere lookers-on at the frolic; but a right goodly company put their shoulders to the wheel.

When the new corps of "help" were installed, they found the hotel clean and tidy from attic to cellar, and everything in its proper place.

The episode was one to be remembered by the malcontents, who had had a severe lesson; by the host, who had seen a genuinely good side of human nature; and the ladies who had so n.o.bly stepped into the breach, learned during their brief period of servitude to be more patient and considerate to those who serve.

How She Helped Him

STORY OF A WIFE

"Well, tell me about Henry Woodruff. How did that match turn out?"

"Bad enough thus far. He is the same delightful, good-hearted fellow as of old; always ready to do a kind, or courteous act. But this woman will be the ruin of him."

"How? What is the trouble?"

"The trouble is she is spoiled to death! She fancies herself an invalid, lies around, does nothing but read Charlotte Braeme and Bertha M.

Clay--has every foolish whim gratified, and, in fact, I don't see how he stands it."

"Did she have any property?"

"Not a cent. It was an out-and-out love match. She has expensive tastes; she is indolent and extravagant. Why, his carriage hire is a big item of itself. She couldn't walk a block, you know."

"Perhaps she really is a sufferer."

"Nonsense; n.o.body believes it. She had that fall, you recollect at the skating rink. At first her spine was thought to be seriously injured.

Woodruff paid out several hundred dollars to have her cured, and the doctors discharged her, well, they said. But it has pleased her to drag around, a load on his hands, ever since. It is thought that he is much crippled financially. I know positively that he has lately mortgaged his interest in the firm. If he can't manage to make, or save five thousand dollars by the end of this year, it is all up with him. And he will never do it at his present rate of living,"

"Why doesn't he tell her? Has she no sense, or feeling at all?"

"None, except for herself; and he is so fond of her that he will indulge her to his very last cent."

"I thought he looked a little down as he pa.s.sed us this morning."

"Yes, he is beginning to realize that he has gone too far, and, poor fellow, it is tugging at him hard."

Did she hear aright? Was it of her, Eleanor Woodruff, that they were talking? Swiftly she sped out of the dark, heavily-curtained back parlor of the stylish boarding-house, and into her room, a gorgeous alcove apartment on the first floor. She could not mount the stairs on account of her weak spine. Weak spine? She forgot all about it as she paced the floor, angry tears gus.h.i.+ng from her large brown eyes. It was shameful--it was wicked--to be so abused. She had never in her whole petted life been found fault with. As to money, what did she know about it? Her father, before his failure and death, had always gratified her. Her husband had never made any difference. These men were friends of his.

Her bitter sobs ceased, and her wounded vanity gradually lost itself in better thoughts. Did all her world think of her like the scathing criticisms of those two chance callers, who thus killed the time of waiting for someone to come down to them? She began to feel glad that she had overheard it. The merest accident had sent her into the back parlor. Was it true? What ought she to do? What could she do? Her dear, kind husband in trouble, and she the cause. Long she sat buried in thought, and when the well-known step sounded at the door her face was radiant with a new resolve.

He came to her large easy-chair with a step somewhat weary, but his kiss was as usual.

"All right, Nellie? Had a good day? Why, you look--let me see--how do you look?" he satd, his kind eyes noting the brightness that shone in hers.

"I look as if I love my big boy very much, don't I?" she responded merrily.

His answer was another kiss, and as he turned toward his dressing closet, her heart ached with unspoken tenderness. Her dinner was brought in. She was not considered strong enough to sit at table. For this service an extra charge was made.

Later, when he opened the evening paper, she sat and watched him. Surely those lines of care were new, now that he was not smiling fondly upon her. Oh, foolish, selfish wife! Rising gently, her long silken tea-gown trailing behind her, she stood beside him, one slender white hand upon his shoulder.

"Well, dear, what now? Another new gown?" he asked, with his old, sweet smile.

She pressed her lips in a slow, reverential fas.h.i.+on, upon the broad white brow, another pang at her heart. Then she spoke:

"Not this time. Harry, dear, let's go to Mrs. Wickham's to board."

"Mrs. Wickham's!" he echoed. "Why, you wouldn't stay in her dull little place a week."

But even as he spoke there flashed through his mind in rapid calculation, "Twenty dollars a week there, forty here; eighty dollars a month saved; nearly a thousand dollars a year."

"Don't you like it here?" were his next words, as he glanced around the luxurious suite.

"Yes," she said, "except there are too many people. It is so noisy."

"Very well, then, we will try it; anything to please my darling," and he drew her close, wrapped in his arms as one might lull a restless child.

The move was made, and Eleanor found that she was not as much fatigued as she had often felt after a day's lounging with a novel. Her husband thought it only a new whim; but as it was not expensive one, he could not remonstrate. When he wanted to take her driving, she playfully told him she was learning to walk--horses made her nervous.