Dandelion Cottage/Chapter 8
CHAPTER VIII
The Girls Disclose A Plan
"DID you sleep well, Miss Blossom?" asked Bettie, shyly waylaying the lodger who was on her way to breakfast.
"Ye—es," said Miss Blossom, smiling brightly, "but in spite of your warning and all my care, the bottom dropped out of my bed and landed the mattress on the floor, but no harm was done. As soon as I discovered that I was not falling down an elevator shaft, I went to sleep again. I think if I had a few nails and some little blocks of wood I could fix those slats so they'd stay in better; you see they're not quite long enough for the bed."
"I'll find some for you," said Bettie. "You'll find them on the parlour table when you get back."
Before the week was over over the girls had discovered that their new friend was in every way a most delightful person. She proved surprisingly skilful with hammer and nails, and besides mending the bed she soon had several of the chairs quite firm on their legs.
"Why," cried Bettie, one day, as she delightedly inspected an old black walnut rocker that had always collapsed at the slightest touch, "this old chair is almost strong enough to walk! I'm so glad you've made so many of them safe, because, when Mrs. Bartholomew Crane comes to see us, she's always afraid to sit down. She's such a nice neighbour that we'd like to make her comfortable."
"We have the loveliest friends," said Jean, with a contented sigh. "It's hard to tell which is the nicest one."
"But the dearest two," explained Marjory, discriminating nicely, "are Mr. Black and Mrs. Crane—excepting you, of course, Miss Blossom."
"Someway," added Bettie, "we always think of those two in one breath, like Dombey and Son, or Jack and Jill."
"But they couldn't be farther apart really," declared Jean. "They're both nice, both are kind of old, both are dark and rather stout, but except for that they're altogether different. Mr. Black has everything in the world that anybody could want and Mrs. Crane hasn't much of anything. Mr. Black is invited to banquets and things and rides in carriages and"
"Has a silk hat," assisted Mabel.
"And Mrs. Crane," continued Jean, paying no attention to the interruption, "can't even afford to ride in the street car—I've heard her say so."
"I wish," groaned generous Mabel, with deep contrition, "that I'd never taken a cent for that lemonade I sold her last spring. If I'd dreamed how good and how poor she was I wouldn't have. She might have had four rides with that money."
"I wish," said Jean, "we could do something perfectly grand and beautiful for Mrs. Crane. She's always doing the kindest little things for other people."
"Well," demanded Marjory, "aren't we going to have her here to dinner, too, when we have Mr. Black? Please don't tell anybody. Miss Blossom—it's to be a surprise."
"Still, just a dinner doesn't seem to be enough," said Jean, who, with her chin in her hand, seemed to be thinking deeply. "Of course it helps but I'd rather save her life or do something like that."
"Little things count for a great deal in this world, sometimes," said Miss Blossom, leaning down to brush her cheek softly against Jean's. "It's generally wiser to leave the big things until one is big enough to handle them."
"Mrs. Crane is pretty big," offered matter-of-fact Mabel.
"Oh, dear," laughed Miss Blossom, "that wasn't at all what I meant."
"Mr. Black," said Bettie, dreamily, "has enough things but I don't believe he really cares about anything in the world but his roses—his face is different when he talks about them, kind of soft all about the corners and not so—not so"
"Daniel Webstery," supplied Jean, understandingly.
"It must be pretty lonely for him without any family," agreed Miss Blossom. "I don't know what would become of father if he didn't have me to keep him cheered up—we're wonderful chums, father and I."
"Oh," mourned tender-hearted Bettie, "I wish I could make Mrs. Crane rich enough so she wouldn't need to mend all the time, and that I could provide Mr. Black with some really truly relatives to love him the way you love your father."
"O Bettie! Bettie!" cried Mabel, suddenly beginning, in her excitement, to bounce up and down on the one chair that possessed springs, "I know exactly how we could help them both. We could beg seven or eight children from the orphan asylum—they're glad to give 'em away—and let Mrs. Crane sell 'em to Mr. Black for—for ten dollars apiece."
Such a storm of merriment followed this simple solution of the problem that Mabel for the moment looked quite crushed. Her chair, incidentally was crushed, too, for Mabel's final bounce proved too much for its frail constitution; its four legs spread suddenly and lowered surprised Mabel gently but unexpectedly to the floor. Everybody laughed again, Mabel as heartily as anyone, and, for a time, the sorrows of Mrs. Crane and Mr. Black were forgotten.
The dinner party, however, still remained uppermost in all their plans. Mabel was in favour of giving it at once, but the other girls were more cautious, so the little mistresses of Dandelion Cottage finally decided to postpone the party until after Miss Blossom had paid her rent in full.
"You see," explained cautious Marjory, one day when the girls were alone, "she might get called away suddenly before the three weeks are up, and if we spent more money than we have it wouldn't be very comfortable. Besides I've never seen seven dollars and a half all at once and I'd like to."
But the dinner plan was no longer the profound secret that it had been at first, for when the young housekeepers had told their mothers about their lodger, they had been obliged to tell them also what they intended to do with the money. In the excitement of the moment, they had all neglected to mention Mrs. Crane, but later, when they made good this omission, their news was received in a most perplexing fashion. The girls were greatly puzzled, but they did not happen to compare notes until after something that happened at the dinner party had reminded them of their parents' incomprehensible behaviour.
"Mamma," said Bettie, one evening at supper time, soon after Miss Blossom's arrival, "I forgot to tell you that we're going to ask Mrs. Crane, too, when we have Mr. Black to dinner. It's to be a surprise for both of them."
"What!" gasped Mrs. Tucker, dropping her muffin, and looking not at Bettie, but at Dr. Tucker. "Surely not Mrs. Crane and Mr. Black, too! You don't mean both at the same time!"
"Why yes, mamma," said Bettie. "It wouldn't cost any more."
Then the little girl looked with astonishment first at her father and then at her mother, for Dr. Tucker, with a warning finger against his lips, was shaking his head just as hard as he could at Mrs. Tucker, who looked the very picture of amazement.
"Why!" asked Bettie, "what's the matter? Don't you think it's a good plan? Isn't it the right thing to do?"
"Yes," said Dr. Tucker, still looking at Bettie's mother, who was nodding her approval, "I shouldn't be surprised if it might prove a very good thing to do. Your idea of making it a surprise to both of them is a good one, too. I should keep it the darkest kind of a secret until the very last moment if I were you."
"Yes," agreed Mrs. Tucker, "I should certainly keep it a secret."
Jean, too, happened to mention the matter at home and with very much the same result. Mr. Mapes looked at Mrs. Mapes with something in his eye that very closely resembled an amused twinkle, and Jean was almost certain that there was an answering twinkle in her mother's eye.
"What's the joke?" asked Jean.
"I couldn't think of spoiling it by telling," said Mrs. Mapes. "If there's anything I can do to help you with your dinner party I shall be delighted to do it."
"Oh, will you?" cried Jean. "When I told you about it last week I thought, someway, that you weren't very much interested."
"I'm very much interested indeed," returned Mrs. Mapes. "I hope you'll be able to keep the surprise part of it a secret to the very last moment. That's always the best part of a dinner party, you know."
"Yes," said Mr. Mapes, "if you know who the other guests are to be it always takes away part of the pleasure."
When Marjory told the news, her Aunty Jane, who seldom smiled and who usually appeared to care very little about the doings in Dandelion Cottage, greatly surprised her niece by suddenly displaying as many as seven upper teeth; she showed, too, such flattering interest in the coming event that Marjory plucked up courage to ask for potatoes and other provisions that might prove useful.
"When you've decided what day you're going to have your party," said Aunty Jane, with astonishing good nature, "I'll give or lend you anything you want, provided you don't tell either of your guests who the other one is to be."
When Mabel told about the plan, she too, was very much perplexed at the way her news was received. Her parents, after one speaking glance at each other, leaned back in their chairs and laughed until the tears rolled down their cheeks. But they, too, heartily approved of the dinner party and advised strict secrecy regarding the guests.
School was out, and, as Bettie said, everyday was Saturday, but the days were slipping away altogether too rapidly. The lawn, by this time, was covered with what Mabel called "real grass," great bunches of Jean's sweetest purple pansies had to be picked every morning so they wouldn't go to seed, and the long bed by the fence threatened to burst at any moment into blossom. Even the much-disturbed vegetable garden was doing so nicely that it was possible to tell the lettuce from the radish plants.
Two of Miss Blossom's three weeks had gone. She herself, was to leave town the following Thursday and the dinner party was to take place the day after; but even the thought of the great event failed to keep the little cottagers quite cheerful, for they hated to think of losing their lovely lodger. Whenever this charming young person was not busy at one or another of the various churches with her father, she was playing with the children. "Just exactly," said Bettie, "as if she were just twelve years old, too." Her clever fingers made dresses for each of the four biggest dolls, and such cunning baby bonnets for each of the four littlest ones.
Best of all, she taught the girls how to do a great many things. She showed them how to turn the narrowest of hems, how to gather a ruffle neatly, and how to take the tiniest of stitches. Bettie, who had to help with the weekly darning, and Marjory, who had to mend her own stockings, actually found it pleasant work after Miss Blossom had shown them several different ways of weaving the threads.
"I just wish," cried Mabel, one day, in a burst of gratitude, "that you'd fall ill, or something so we could do something for you. You're just lovely to us."
"Thank you, Mabel," said Miss Blossom, with eyes that twinkled delightedly, "I'm sure you'd take beautiful care of me—I'm almost tempted to try it. Shall I have measles, or just plain smallpox?"