Ruth Fielding Down in Dixie Part 30

"It's awful to feel so towards any human creature," Ruth went on. "And I fear that we ought to pity her, not to hate her."

"I should like to know why?" demanded Helen, in some heat.

"Mrs. Holloway told one of the ladies the particulars of Miss Miggs'

coming down here, and why she is such a nervous wreck-and the lady just told me."

"'Nervous wreck,'" scoffed Helen. "Wrecked by her ugly temper, you mean."

"She has been the sole support, and nurse as well, of a bed-ridden aunt for years. During this last term-she teaches in a big school in Bannister, Ma.s.sachusetts-she had a very hard time. She has always had trouble with her girls; and evidently doesn't love them."

"Not so's you'd notice it," grumbled Helen.

"And they made her a good deal of trouble. The old aunt became more exacting toward the last, and finally Miss Miggs was up almost all night with the invalid and then was hara.s.sed in the schoolroom all day by the thoughtless girls."

"Oh, dear me, Ruthie! now you are trying to find excuses for the mean old thing."

"I'm telling you-that's all."

"Well! I don't know that I want you to tell me," sniffed Helen. "I don't feel as ugly toward that Miggs woman as I did."

"I feel very angry with her myself," Ruth said. "It is hard for me to get over anger, I am afraid."

"But you are slow to wrath. 'Beware the anger of a patient man'

says-says-well, _somebody_. 'Overhaul your book and, when found, make note of,'" giggled Helen. "Well! how did Martha get away from the aunt?"

"The aunt got away from her," said Ruth, gravely. "She died-just before the end of the term. Altogether poor Miss Miggs was 'all in,' as the saying is."

Helen sniffed again. She would not own up that she was affected by the story.

"Then," said Ruth, earnestly, "just a few days before the end of school some of her girls played a trick on the poor thing and frightened her-oh, horribly! She fell at her desk unconscious, and the girls who had played the trick ran out of the room and left her there-of course, not knowing that she had fainted. She broke her gla.s.ses, and when she came to she could not find her way about, and almost went mad. It was a very serious matter, indeed. They found her wandering about the room quite out of her mind. Mrs. Holloway had already invited her down here and sent her a ticket from Norfolk to Pee Dee, where she was to take boat again. The doctors said the trip would be the best thing for her, and they packed her off," concluded Ruth.

"Well-she's to be pitied, I suppose," said Helen, grudgingly. "But I can't fall in love with her."

"Who could? She has had a hard time, just the same, When she lost her ticket she had barely money enough to bring her on to Pee Dee where Mrs.

Holloway met her. The poor thing was worried to death. You see, all her money had been spent on the aunt, and her funeral expenses."

"Well! she's unfortunate. But she had no business to accuse us of stealing her ticket-if it was stolen at all."

"Of course somebody picked it up. But the ticket may have done n.o.body any good. She says she left it in the railroad folder on that seat in the steamer's saloon-you remember."

"I remember vividly," agreed Helen, "our first encounter with Miss Miggs." Then she began to laugh. "And wasn't she funny?"

"'Not so's you'd notice it!' to quote your own cla.s.sic language," said Ruth, sharply. "There was nothing funny about it."

"That is when we first saw Curly on the boat."

"Yes. He was there. But he didn't hear anything of the row, I guess. He says he had no idea we were on that boat-and we saw him three times."

"And heard him jump overboard," finished Helen. "The foolish boy."

She went away to sit by him and tell him stories. Helen was developing quite a reputation as a nurse. The boy was in pain and anything was welcome that kept his mind for a little off the troublesome leg.

The girls were very busy that evening with another matter. Permission had been asked and obtained to give the proposed "chamber concert" for Curly's benefit. What the boy had done in saving two lives was well known now among the enforced guests at Holloway's, and the idea of any entertainment was welcome.

There was a mimeograph on which the hotel menus were printed and Ruth got up a gorgeous program in two-colored ink of the "chamber concert,"

inviting everybody to come.

"And they've just got to come, my dears," said Nettie, who took upon herself the distribution of the concert programs and-as Helen called it-the "boning" for the money. "Ev'ry white person in this hotel has got to pay a dollar at least, fo' the pleasure of hearing Helen play and Ruth sing. That's their admission."

"I'd like to see you get a dollar for that purpose out of Miss Miggs,"

giggled Helen.

"Never mind, honey, somebody will have to pay fo' her," declared Nettie.

"Then we'll sell the choice seats and the boxes at auction."

"Goodness, child!" cried Ruth. "What boxes do you mean; soap boxes?"

"The front stairs," said Nettie, placidly. "The seats in the upstairs hall here will be reserved, and must bring a premium, too."

"The ingenuity of the girl!" gasped Ruth.

"Why, Ruthie," said Helen, "it isn't _anything_ to get up a concert, or to carry a program all alone. But it takes genius to devise such schemes as this. You will be a multi-millionairess before you die, Nettie."

"I expect to be," returned the Southern girl. "Now, listen: Each of these broad stairs will hold four people comfortably. We will letter the stairs and number the seats."

"But those on the lower step will have their feet in the water!" cried Ruth, in a gale of laughter.

"Very well. They will be nearest to the performers. You say yourselves that you will probably have to be barefooted, when you are down there singing and playing," said Nettie. "They ought to pay an extra premium for being allowed to be so near to the performers. That is 'the bald-headed row.'"

"And every bald head that sits there will have a nice cold in his head,"

Ruth declared.

However, Nettie had her way in every particular. The next evening the auction of "reserved seats and boxes" was held in the upper hall. Mr.

Jimson officiated as auctioneer and for an hour or more the party managed to extract a great deal of wholesome fun from the affair.

The deputy sheriff was made to subscribe for the two lower tiers of seats on the stair at a good price, because, as Mr. Jimson said, "he was the bigges' an' fattes' man in dis hyer dest.i.tute community." The other seats sold merrily. No one hesitated over paying the admission fee.

There is n.o.body in the world as generous both in spirit and actual practice as these Southern people.

Almost two hundred dollars was raised for Curly's benefit. The concert was held the afternoon following the auctioning of the seats, and the chums covered themselves with glory.

The piano was rolled out into the hall and the negroes knocked together a platform on which Ruth and Helen could stand and play, while Nettie perched herself on the piano bench to accompany them, and kept her feet out of the water.

They sang the old glees together-all three of them, for Nettie possessed a sweet contralto voice. Ruth's ballads were appreciated to the full and Helen-although the instrument she used was so poor a one-delighted the audience with her playing.

When she softly played the old, sweet harmonies, and Ruth sang them, the applause from Curly's couch at the end of the hall to the foot of the stairs where the deputy sheriff sat with his boots in the water, was tremendous.

The concert ended with the girls standing in a row with clasped hands and for the glory of Briarwood giving the old Sweetbriar "war-cry:"

"S. B.-Ah-h-h!