The Motor Maids in Fair Japan Part 28

"I just can't. That's all."

Billie felt as if a rough hand had seized her by her collar and given her a good shaking.

"Oh, very well, Nancy" she said, and went softly out of the room.

"I am sure she must be really ill," she thought, trying to put a charitable interpretation on this act of selfishness, but even illness could hardly account for anything so entirely remote from their usual relations. And, apparently, Nancy had no fever and was only a little under the weather with a headache.

Therefore, when the subject of her raincoat had come under discussion, Billie quickly changed it.

"Do look at that queer-looking crowd," she e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed, pointing to a group of people walking in couples along the roadside. Their white kirtles were girded high about their waists and they carried staffs.

As the company marched along, always facing Fuji, they began singing a weird chant. When the motors drew nearer the tourists saw that each man wore a huge mushroom hat made of lightest pith and from his neck hung a piece of matting suspended by a cord.

"That must be one of the Pilgrim Clubs," announced Nicholas. "There are hundreds of them in j.a.pan and they are fearfully expensive to join. The dues are from eight to fifteen cents a year. Every summer a club selects a delegate to take a nice little walking trip to a shrine and bring back blessings for the other members. His expenses are paid and lots of the other members go on their own hook. All the inns make special rates and it's come to be a jolly way to spend one's vacation, combining pleasure and religion. You see they've got the costume down to the finest point,"

he continued. "They wear umbrellas on their heads, and the matting hanging around their necks serves as a raincoat, seat and bed. It's the coolest, lightest and most complete walking equipment I ever saw."

"They make me feel terribly worldly-minded and luxurious," exclaimed Billie. "I never thought of bringing back a holy blessing to a friend."

"We can take back a blessing for Miss Nancy, if you like," said Nicholas, smiling. "A flask of water from a spring on the sacred mountain would do, wouldn't it?"

"But we haven't any flask."

"We have the thermos bottle," put in Elinor. "That would keep it cool enough for her to drink."

"She shouldn't drink it. She should sprinkle herself with it, or bathe in it," said Nicholas, amused at this ultra-modern way of carrying back a heavenly blessing.

But Billie recalled the suggestion later and actually did fill the thermos bottle from a little spring that bubbled at the foot of Fuji and trickled down a green slope where the company had stopped for luncheon.

"I do wish Nancy had come," she found herself saying while she spread the white cloth on the gra.s.s and opened the treasures of the luncheon hamper, which consisted of cold chicken and sandwiches and eggs prepared in a peculiar pickly way, as some one had described it. "It was a shame for her to miss this lovely trip. I am sure Fuji would have cured anybody's headache. It's so beautiful and so majestic."

"It's cured mine," remarked Mr. Buxton, "either Fuji or something even more potent." Here he cast a languis.h.i.+ng and eloquent glance toward Miss Campbell who flicked the gra.s.s with the end of her parasol and pretended not to have heard a word.

Nicholas and Reggie grinned openly. Mr. Campbell stifled a smile behind a large sandwich and the girls carefully avoided each other's eyes.

"He's got it bad, Miss Billie," whispered Nicholas. "Is this a common occurrence with Miss Campbell?"

"It is, indeed," answered Billie. "There is always one and sometimes several wherever we go. Once, in Salt Lake City, it saved us no end of trouble and brought two lovers together, because a horrid old Mormon gentleman caught the fever. He had it so badly that we thought he would just carry Cousin Helen off by force, but he was deathly afraid of her."

"Remember your promise, Miss Elinor," called Mr. Campbell presently.

"Where's your guitar?"

Some one fetched the guitar from the car and Elinor, leaning against a tree, struck several chords and smiled mischievously.

"Shall it be a love song?" she asked.

"Something religious would be more appropriate in this sacred spot,"

observed Miss Campbell severely. But Elinor, ignoring the suggestion, began to sing:

"'O, My Luve's like a red, red rose, That's newly sprung in June.

My Luve's like the melodie That's sweetly played in tune.

"'As fair thou art, my bonnie la.s.s, So deep in luve am I, And I will luve thee still, my dear, Till a' the seas gang dry.

"'Till a' the seas gang dry, my dear, And rocks melt wi' the sun, I will luve thee still, my dear, While the sands of life shall run.

"'And fare thee weel, my only Luve, And fare thee weel a while, And I will come again My Luve, Tho' it were ten thousand mile.'"

While Elinor sang this charming song Mr. Buxton regarded Miss Helen Campbell with an expression so abjectly adoring that Mr. Campbell gave a roar of boyish laughter and laid himself flat on the ground in the ecstasy of his amus.e.m.e.nt. They all laughed, indeed. Even Miss Campbell joined in, in spite of her annoyance.

"I should think you might sing your own songs, Buxton, instead of letting a young lady do it for you," said Mr. Campbell at last.

"Allow me," answered the bachelor calmly.

He seized the guitar, re-tuned it with great care, and began strumming lightly on the strings. Suddenly he lifted up his voice in song and n.o.body attempted to keep a serious countenance because he seemed entirely oblivious to all jests at his expense. Here is the song he sang:

"A Magnet hung in a hardware shop, And all around was a loving crop Of scissors and needles, nails and knives, Offering love for all their lives; But for iron the Magnet felt no whim; Though he charmed iron, it charmed not him; From needles and nails and knives he'd turn, For he'd set his heart on a Silver Churn!

"A Silver Churn! A Silver Churn!

His most esthetic Very magnetic Fancy took this turn: If I can wheedle A knife or a needle, Why not a Silver Churn?

"And Iron and Steel expressed surprise; The needles opened their well-drilled eyes, The penknives felt shut up, no doubt; The scissors declared themselves cut out.

The kettles, they boiled with rage, 'tis said; While every nail went off its head And hither and thither began to roam, Till a hammer came up and drove them home.

"It drove them home! It drove them home!

While this magnetic, Peripatetic Lover, he lived to learn, By no endeavor Can a Magnet ever Attract a Silver Churn!"

"Well, really," cried Mr. Campbell, at the end of the song when the laughter had somewhat died down, "really, I think Buxton, you are the most shameless old soul I ever met in my life. Come along and start home.

A shower is coming up, and we'd better get the cars into the valley before it catches us and wets the Silver Churn, and the scissors, and needles, and nails, and knives."

A shower did come up, a big one that lasted most of the way home, and Billie's gray linen suit was wet through, but the weather was warm and except that she looked extremely bedraggled, she was none the worse and refused to accept the loan of Nicholas' coat. They left the three guests in Tokyo with the hired motor car, and Mr. Campbell with Miss Helen and Mary joined the others in the "Comet." So it was that the subject of the raincoat came up again. Miss Campbell, seeing her young cousin's wet suit, exclaimed:

"Child! Where is your raincoat? How often have I told you never to leave it behind, especially in this country where it rains more than it s.h.i.+nes."

"It's torn, Cousin Helen," answered Billie meekly.

"But why, pray, didn't you take Nancy's?"

Billie considered a moment what she should say and ended by saying nothing at all.

"Why didn't you borrow Nancy's, Billie?" asked Elinor.

"Nancy didn't seem willing to lend it," answered Billie at last, slowly.

There was a strained silence. Then Miss Campbell remarked:

"I believe the child must be seriously ill. It sounds like typhoid fever.

I think we'd better send for the doctor as soon as we reach home."