Three Women

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10. Readjustment



It was all over. The excitement had subsided and all that remained to tell the story of the previous afternoon's commotion was a fire-scorched, water-soaked dwelling with a miscellaneous collection of articles decorating its lawn. When the early morning sunshine looked down upon the home which for eight years had sheltered the Carruths, it beheld desolation complete. Alas for Eleanor's chemicals! Her experiments had cost the family dear.

The only living being in sight was a policeman mounting guard over the ruins. A staid and stolid son of the Vatterland who had spent the wee sma' hours upon the premises and now stood upon the piazza upright and rigid as the inanimate objects all about him. Beside him was a small, toy horse "saddled and bridled and ready to ride," and anything more absurd than the picture cut by this guardian of the law and his miniature charger it would be hard to imagine.

Meanwhile the family was housed among friends who had been quick to offer them shelter, Mr. Stuyvesant insisting that Mrs. Carruth and Constance accept his aunt's hospitality through him, while the next door neighbor, Mr. Henry, harbored Eleanor, Jean and Mammy, who refused point blank to go beyond sight of the premises and her charge--Baltie.

Mammy was the heroine of the hour; for what the old woman had not thought of when everyone else's wits were scattered was hardly worth thinking of. In the blanket which she had charged the girls to guard were all of Mrs. Carruth's greatest treasures, among them a beautiful miniature of Mr. Carruth of which no one but Mammy had thought. Jewelry which had belonged to her mother was there, valuable papers hastily snatched from her desk, and many of the girl's belongings which would never have been saved but for Mammy's forethought. At seven o'clock, when all was over, the crowd dispersed and the family gathered together in Mr. Henry's living-room to collect their wits and draw a long breath, Mrs. Carruth drew Mammy to one side to ask:

"Mammy, what is the meaning of this receipt? I cannot understand it. Who has paid this sum and where was it paid?"

"Baby, dere comes times when 'taint a mite er use ter tell what we gwine do. Dat 'surance hatter be squar'd up an' dat settled it. So I squar'd it--."

"Oh, Mammy! Mammy!" broke in Mrs. Carruth, almost in tears.

"Hush, chile! Pay 'tention ter me. What would a come of we-all if I hadn't paid dat bill den an' dar? Bress de Lawd I had de cash an' don' pester me wid questions. Ain' I tole yo' I'se rich? Well den, dat settles it. When yo is, yo' kin settle wid me. Dat don' need no argufyin' do it? Now go long wid Miss Constance an' Massa Stuyvesant lak dey say an' git yo' sef ca'med down. Yo' all a shakin' an' a shiverin' lak yo' got de ager, an' dat won' never do in de roun' worl'. Yo'll be down sick on my han's."

And that was all the old woman would ever hear about it. When the thirty dollars were returned to her in the course of a few days she took it with a chuckle saying:

"Huh! Reckons I knows wha' ter investigate my money. Done git my intrus so quick it like ter scar me."

After the first excitement was over came the question of where the family was to live, and it was Hadyn Stuyvesant who settled it forthwith by offering the home which had been his mother's; a pretty little dwelling in the heart of Riveredge which had been closed since his mother's death and his own residence with his aunt. So in the course of the next week the Carruths were installed therein and began to adjust themselves to the new conditions The first question to be answered was the one concerning their home. Should it be rebuilt with the money to be paid by the insurance company, or should it be sold? It was hard to decide, for sentiment was strongly in favor of returning to the home they all loved, while sound sense dictated selling the land and thus lessening expenses. Sound sense carried the day, and the little house on Hillside street became home, and in the course of a few weeks the machinery ran along with its accustomed smoothness, although it was some time before the family recovered from the shock of realizing how close they had come to losing all they possessed, and also keenly alive to the fact that what had been saved must be carefully guarded. Fifteen thousand was not an alarming sum to fall back upon and the rent for the new home although modest, compared with what their own would have commanded, had to be considered.

Meanwhile the girls had returned to their school duties, the older ones working harder than ever, especially Eleanor, whose conscience troubled her not a little at thought of her carelessness which had caused all the trouble, for well she realized that her failure to care properly for the powerful acids with which she had been experimenting when Constance appeared upon the scene had started the fire.

Constance had immediately set to work to evolve from the apparel rescued a winter wardrobe for the family, and displayed such ingenuity in bringing about new gowns and headgear from the old ones that the family flourished like green bay trees. Still Constance was not satisfied, and one afternoon said to Eleanor, who now shared her room, but who had not laid in a new supply of chemicals:

"Nornie, put down that book and listen to me, for I'm simmering with words o' wisdom and if I don't find a vent I'll boil over presently."

Eleanor laid aside the book she was poring over, laughing as she asked:

"What is it--some new scheme for making a two-pound steak feed five hungry mouths, or a preparation to apply to the soles of shoes to keep them from wearing out?"

"It has more to do with the stomach than the feet, but I'm not joking. I want to take account of stock and find out just where we are at and just what we can do. Mother has her hands and head more than full just now, and I think I ought to give a pull at the wheel too."

"And what shall I be about while you are doing the pulling? It seems to me a span can usually pull harder than a single horse. By-the-way, apropos of horses, what has Mammy done to poor old Baltie? Do you realize that she has not yet had him two months, but no one would ever recognize the old horse for the decrepit creature Jean led home that afternoon."

"I know it! Isn't she a marvel? I believe she is half witch. Why, blind and twenty-five years old as he is, old Baltie to-day would bring Jabe Raulsbury enough money to make the covetous old sinner smile, I believe; if anything on earth could make him smile. I thought I should have screamed when she started off with her steed the other day. That old phaeton and harness she found in the barn here were especially sent by Providence, I believe. I never expect to see a funnier sight if I live to be a hundred years old than Mammy driving off down the road with that great basket of apples by her side and Jean perched behind in the rumble. Mammy was simply superb and proud as the African princess she insists she is," and Constance laughed heartily at the picture she made.

"What did she do with her apples? I wish I could have seen her," cried Eleanor.

"She had them stored away in our cellar. She had gathered them herself from mother's pet tree and packed them carefully in a couple of barrels. How on earth she finds time to do all the things she manages to I can't understand. She took that basket out to Mrs. Fletcher. You remember Mrs. Fletcher once said there were no apples like ours and Mammy remembered it. Still, I am afraid Mrs. Fletcher would never have seen that basket of apples if her home had not adjoined the Raulsbury place. You know Jabe had to pay a large fine before he could get free. Such an hour of triumph rarely comes to two human beings as came to Mammy and Jean when they drove that old horse past Jabe's gateway and kind fate drew him to that very spot at the moment. Mammy is still chuckling over it, and Jean isn't to be lived with. But enough of Mammy and her charger, let's get to stock-taking."

"Yes, do," said Eleanor.

"I've been putting things down in black and white and here it is," said practical Constance, opening a little memorandum book and seating herself beside her sister. "You see mother has barely fifteen hundred dollars a year from father's life insurance and even that is somewhat lessened by the slump in those old stocks. Now comes the fire insurance settlement and the interest on that won't be over seven hundred at the outside, will it?"

"I'm afraid not," said Eleanor with a doubtful shake of her head. "But suppose we are able to sell the old place?"

"Yes, 'suppose.' If we do, well and good, but supposes aren't much account for immediate needs, and those are the things we've got to think about now."

"Then let me think too," broke in Eleanor.

"You may think all you've a mind to; that's exactly what your brains are for, and some day you'll astonish us all. Meanwhile I'll work."

"Now, Constance, what are you planning? You know perfectly well that if you leave school and take up something that I shall too. I won't take all the advantages."

"Who said I had any notion of leaving school? Not a bit of it. My plan won't affect my school work. But of that later. Now to our capital. Mother will have at the outside nineteen hundred a year, and out of that she will have to pay five hundred rent for this house. That leaves fourteen hundred wherewith to feed and clothe five people, doesn't it? Now, she can't possibly feed, let alone clothe, us for less than twenty dollars a week, can she? And out of that must come fuel which is no small matter now-a-days. That leaves only three hundred and sixty dollars for all the other expenses of the year, and, Nornie, it isn't enough. We could live on less in town I dare say, but town is no place for Jean while she's so little. She'd give up the ghost without a place to romp in. Then, too, mother loves every stone in Riveredge, and she is going to stay here if I can manage it. So listen: You know what a fuss everybody at the fair made over my nut-fudge and pralines. Well, I'm going to make candy to sell----."

"Oh, Constance, you can't! You mustn't!" interrupted Eleanor whose instincts shrank from any member of her family launching upon a business enterprise.

"I can and I must," contradicted Constance positively. "And what is more, I shall. So don't have a conniption fit right off, because I've thought it all out and I know just exactly what I can do."

"Mother will never consent," said Eleanor firmly, and added, "and I hope she won't."

"Now Nornie, see here," cried Constance with decided emphasis. "What is the use of being so ridiculously high and mighty? We aren't the first people, by a long chalk, that have met with financial reverses and been forced to do something to earn a livelihood. The woods are full of them and they are none the less respected either. For my part, I'd rather hustle round and earn my own duddies than settle down and wish for them, and wail because I can't have them while mother strives and struggles to make both ends meet. I haven't brains to do big things in the world, but I've got what Mammy calls 'de bangenest han's' and we'll see what they'll bang out!" concluded Constance resolutely.

"Mammy will never let you," cried Eleanor, playing what she felt to be her trump card.

"On the contrary, Mammy is going to help me," announced Constance triumphantly.

"What, Mammy consent to a Blairsdale going into trade?" cried Eleanor, feeling very much as though the foundations of the house were sinking.

"Even so, Lady," answered Constance, laughing at her sister's look of dismay. "Old Baltie was not rescued for naught. His days of usefulness were not ended as you shall see. But don't look so horrified, and, above all else, don't say one word to mother. There is no use to worry her, and remember she is a Blairsdale and it won't be so easy to bring her to my way of thinking as it has been to bring you; you're only half one, like myself, and remember we've got Carruth blood to give us mercantile instincts."

"As though the Carruths were not every bit as good as the Blairsdales," brindled Eleanor indignantly.

"Cock-a-doodle! See its feathers ruffle. You are as spunky as the Henry's game cock," cried Constance laughing and gathering Eleanor's head into her arms to maul it until her hair came down.

"Well," retorted Eleanor, struggling to free herself from the tempestuous embrace, "so they are."

"Yes, my beloved sister. I'll admit all that, but bear in mind that their ancestors were born in Pennsylvania not in 'ole Caroliny, and that's the difference 'twixt tweedle-dum and tweedle-dee. I don't believe Mad Anthony stopped to consider whether he was a patrician or a plebeian when he was storming old Stony Point, or getting fodder for Valley Forge, so I don't believe I will, when I set out to hustle for frocks and footgear for his descendants. So put your pride in your pocket, Nornie, and watch me grow rich and the family blossom out in luxuries undreamed of. I'm going to do it: you'll see," ended Constance in a tone so full of hope and courage that Eleanor then and there resolved not to argue the point further or discourage her.

"When are you going to begin this enterprise?" she asked.

"This very day. I'm only waiting for Mammy to come back from market with some things I need, and there she is now. Good-bye. Go look after the little Mumsie, or Jean; you'd find your hands full with the last undertaking, no doubt," and with a merry laugh Constance ran down-stairs to greet Mammy who was just entering the back door.