Chapter XII: Tea with Mrs. Eland

Neale was right. At the supper table at the old Corner House that night (the Saturday night supper was always a gala affair) Mrs. MacCall asked, anxiously:

"What's the matter with you, boy? Are you sick?"

"Oh, no, Mrs. MacCall. Do I look sick?" responded the white-haired boy, startled.

"Must be somethin' the matter with you," said the housekeeper, with conviction. "Otherwise you wouldn't stop at only two helpings of beans and only four fishcakes. I'll have to speak to Mr. Con Murphy," she added grimly. "He'd better see that you have a good course of jalap. You're getting puny."

Uncle Rufus chuckled unctiously from the background. "Dat boy," he murmured, "ain't sickenin' none. He done et a peck o' chestnuts, I reckon, already."

In spite of Neale's "puny" appetite, they had a great chestnut roast that evening. Eva Larry and Myra Stetson came in unexpectedly, and the Corner House girls had a very hilarious time. Neale was the only boy present; but he was rather used, by this time, to playing squire to "a whole raft of girls."

"And, oh, girls," cried the news-bearer, Eva, "what do you think? The School Board has voted to let us give _The Carnation Countess_. I heard it to-day. It's straight. The parts will be given out this next week. And, oh! poor us!"

"Miss Lederer said we would have quite important parts in the play," Ruth said complacently.

"And _we_ can only look on," wailed Myra Stetson, quite as lugubriously as Eva.

"And I'm going to be a bee--I'm going to be a bee!" Dot danced around the table singing this refrain.

"I hope you won't be such a noisy one," Tess said admonishingly. "You're worse than a bumblebee, Dot Kenway."

Agnes really felt too bad to say anything for a minute or two. It was true she felt better in her heart since she had confessed to Mr. Bob Buckham; but the fact that she could not act in the musical play was as keen a disappointment as lively, ambitious Agnes Kenway had ever suffered.

For once Eva Larry's news was exact. It was announced to all grades of the Milton Public Schools on Monday morning that _The Carnation Countess_ was to be produced at the Opera House, probably during the week preceding Christmas, and all classes were to have an opportunity of helping in the benefit performance.

A certain company of professional players, headed by a capable manager and musical director, were to take charge of the production, train the children when assembled, and arrange the stage setting. Half the proceeds of the entertainment were to go to the Milton Women's and Children's Hospital--an institution in which everybody seemed now to be interested.

The fact that a certain little girl named Tess Kenway, had really set the ball of interest in motion, was quite forgotten, save by a few. As for the next to the youngest Corner House girl, she never troubled her sweet-tempered little self about it. "Oh! I'm so glad!" she sighed, with satisfaction. "Now my Mrs. Eland can stay."

"What's that you say, Theresa?" Miss Pepperill's sharp voice demanded.

Tess repeated her expression of gratitude.

"Humph!" ejaculated the red-haired teacher. "So you are still interested in Mrs. Eland, are you? Have you seen her again?"

"I am going to take tea with her this afternoon," said Tess, eagerly. "So is my sister, Dot."

"You don't know if she has found _her_ sister yet?" asked Miss Pepperill, but more to herself than as though she expected a reply. "No! of course not."

Tess hurried to meet Dot after school. She found her sister at the girls' gate of the primary department, hugging the Alice-doll (of course, in a brand new cloak) and listening with wide-eyed interest to the small, impish, black-haired boy who was talking earnestly to her.

"And then I shall run away and sail the rollin' billers," he declared. "I hope they won't find old Pepperpot after I tie her to her chair--not--not from Friday afternoon till Monday mornin', when they open school again. That's what I hope. And by that time I can sail clean around the Cape of Good Hope to the Cannibal Islands, I guess."

"Oh-ee!" gasped Dot. "And suppose the cannibals eat you, Sammy Pinkney? What would your mother say?"

"She'd be sorry, I guess," said Sammy, darkly. "And so would my pop. But shucks!" he added quickly. "Pirates never get eat by cannibals. They're too smart."

"That's all you know about it, Sammy Pinkney!" said Tess, sternly, breaking in upon the boasting of the scapegrace, who dearly loved an audience. "We met a man this summer that knew all about pirates--or _said_ he did; didn't we, Dot?"

"Oh, yes. The clam-man," the smallest Corner House girl agreed. "And he had a wooden leg."

"Did he get it bein' a pirate?" demanded Sammy.

"He got it fighting pirates," Tess said firmly. "But the pirates got it worse. They got their legs mowed off."

"We-ell. Huh! I guess it would be fun to have a wooden leg, at that," the boy stoutly declared. "Anyway, a feller with a wooden leg wouldn't have growin' pains in it; and I have 'em awful when I go to bed nights, in _my_ legs."

As the little girls went on to the hospital, Dot suddenly felt some hesitancy about going, after all. "You know, Tess, they do such _awful_ things to folks in horsepistols!"

"For pity's sake! stop calling it _that_," begged Tess. "And they don't do awful things in hospitals."

"Yes they do; they take off folkses legs and arms and pull their teeth and----"

"They don't!" denied Tess, flatly. "Not in this hospital, anyway. Here, they cure sick ladies and little children that are lame and sick. Oh! it's a be-a-utiful place!"

"How do you know?" asked Dot, doubtfully.

"Sadie Goronofsky's cousin was there," Tess said, with confidence. "Sadie went to see her--and she had jelly and oranges and farina puddings and all kinds of nice things to eat. Sadie knows, because she let her lick the tumblers and dishes. Besides, we're not going to be patients there," Tess declared. "We're only calling on Mrs. Eland."

"I hope she has some of that nice farina pudding for tea," sighed Dot. "I'm fond of that."

"Don't be a little gobbler, Dot, if she gives us anything good," said Tess, with her most elder-sisterly air. "Remember, we promised Ruth to be little ladies."

"But goodness!" gasped Dot, "that doesn't mean that we can's eat _at all_, does it? I'm dreadful hungry. I always am after school and you know Mrs. MacCall lets us have a bite. If being a _lady_ means going _hungry_, I don't want to be one--so there, Tess Kenway!"

This frank statement, and Dot's vehemence, might have caused some friction between the sisters (for of course Tess felt her importance, being the older, and having been particularly charged by Ruth to look after her sister) had they not met Neale O'Neil coming from the clothing store on High Street. He had a big bundle under his arm.

"Oh, I know what you've got, Neale!" cried Tess. "Those are your new clothes."

"You're a good little guesser, Tess Kenway," laughed the boy. "And it's a Jim-dandy suit. Ought to be. It cost me eight dollars of my hard earned lucre."

"What's that?" demanded Dot, hearing something new.

"Lucre is wealth. But eight dollars isn't much wealth, is it?" responded Neale, and passed on, leaving the two little girls at the steps of the main entrance to the hospital.

There was no time now for discussing what Mrs. MacCall called "pros and cons," for the hall door was opened and a girl in a blue uniform and white cap beckoned the two little visitors up the steps.

"You are the two children Mrs. Eland is expecting, aren't you?" she asked.

"Oh, yes," said Tess, politely. "We have a 'pointment with her."

"That's right," laughed the nurse. "She's waiting for you in her room. And the tea smells good."

"Is--is there farina pudding?" asked Dot, hesitatingly. "Did you smell that, too?"

Tess tugged at the smaller girl's coat and scowled at her reprovingly; but the pretty nurse only laughed. "I shouldn't be surprised if it were farina pudding, little girl," she said.

And it was! Dot had two plates of it, besides her pretty cup of cambric tea. But Tess talked with Mrs. Eland in a really ladylike manner.

In the first place the matron of the hospital was very glad to see the two Corner House girls. She did not have on her gray cloak or little bonnet with the white ruche. Dot's Alice-doll's new cloak was a flattering imitation of the cut and color of the hospital matron's outdoor garment.

Mrs. Eland was just as pink-cheeked and pretty as ever indoors; but the children saw that her hair was almost white. Whether it was the white of age, or of trouble, it would have been hard to say. In either case Mrs. Eland had not allowed the cause of her whitening hair to spoil her temper or cheerfulness.

That her natural expression of countenance was sad, one must allow; but when she talked with her little visitors, and entertained them, her sprightliness chased the troubled lines from the lady's face.

"And--and have you found your sister yet, Mrs. Eland?" Tess asked hesitatingly in the midst of the visit. "I--I wouldn't ask," she hastened to say, "but Miss Pepperill wanted to know. She asked twice."

"Miss Pepperill?" asked the matron, somewhat puzzled.

"Yes, ma'am. Don't you 'member? She's my teacher that wanted me to learn the sovereigns of England."

"Why, of course! I had forgotten," admitted Mrs. Eland. "Miss Pepperill."

"Yes. And she's much int'rested in you," said Tess, seriously. "Of course, everybody is. They are going to make a play, and we're going to be in it----"

"I'm going to be a bee," said Dot, in a muffled voice.

"And it's going to be played for money so's you can stay here in the hospital and be matron," went on Tess.

"Ah, yes, my dear! I know about that," said Mrs. Eland, with a very sweet smile. "And I know who to thank for it, too."

"Do you?" returned Tess, quite unconscious of the matron's meaning. "Well! you see, Miss Pepperill's interested, too. She only asked me for the second time to-day if I'd seen you again and if you had found your sister."

"No, no, my dear. I never can hope to find her now," said Mrs. Eland, shaking her head.

"She was lost in a fire," said Dot, suddenly.

"Why, yes! how did you know?" queried the lady, in surprise.

"The man that shot the eagle said so," Dot replied. "And he wanted to know if you were much related to Lem--Lemon----"

"_Lem-u-el!_" almost shrieked Tess. "Not Lemon, child. Lemuel Aden."

"Oh, yes!" agreed the smaller girl, quite calmly. "That's just as though I said Salmon for Samuel--like Sammy Pinkney. Well! It isn't such a great difference, is it?"

"Of course not, my dear," laughed Mrs. Eland. "And from what people tell me, my Uncle Lemuel must have been a good deal like a lemon."

"Then he was your uncle?" asked Tess.

"And--and was he real puckrative?" queried Dot. "For that's what Aunt Sarah says a lemon is."

"He was a pretty sour man, I guess," said Mrs. Eland, shaking her head. "I came East when I was a little girl, looking for him. That was after my dear father and mother died and they had taken my sister away from me," she added. "But what about the man that shot the eagle? Who was he?"

Tess told her about their adventures of the previous Saturday in the chestnut woods and the visit to the farmhouse afterward. Dot added:

"And that eagle man don't like your Uncle Lem-u-el, either."

"Why not?" asked Mrs. Eland, quickly, and flushing a little.

Before Tess could stop the little chatterbox--if she had thought to--Dot replied: "'Cause he says your uncle's brother stole. He told us so. So he did, Tess Kenway--now, didn't he?"

"You mustn't say such things," Tess admonished her.

But the mischief was done. The matron lost all her pretty color, and her lips looked blue and her face drawn.

"What do you suppose he meant by that?" she asked slowly, and almost whispering the question. "That my Uncle Lem's brother was a thief? Why, Uncle Lem only had one brother."

"He was the one," Dot said, in a most matter-of-fact tone. "It was five hundred dollars. And the eagle man said he and his mother suffered for that money and she died--his mother, you know--'cause she had to work so hard when it was gone. Didn't she, Tess?"

The conversation had got beyond Tess Kenway's control. She felt, small as she was, that something wrong had been said. By the look on Mrs. Eland's pale face the kind-hearted child knew that she was hurt and confused--and Tess was the tenderest hearted child in the world.

"Oh, Mrs. Eland!" she crooned, coming close to the lady who sat before her little stove, with her face turned aside that the children should not see the tears gathering in her eyes. "Oh, Mrs. Eland! I guess Mr. Buckham didn't mean that. Of course, none of _your_ folks could be thieves--of course not!"

In a little while the matron asked the children a few more questions, including Mr. Buckham's full name, and how he was to be reached. She had not been in the neighborhood of Ipswitch Curve since she had first come from the West--a newly made orphan and with the loss of her little sister a fresh wound in her poor heart. So she had forgotten the strawberry farmer, and most of the other people in the old neighborhood where her father had lived before going West.

Dot Kenway was quite unconscious of having involuntarily inflicted a wound in Mrs. Eland's mind and heart that she was doomed not to recover from for long weeks. As the sisters bade the matron good-bye, and started for the old Corner House, just as dusk was falling, Tess felt that her friend, Mrs. Eland, was really much sadder than she had been when they had begun their call.

Tess, however, could not understand the reason for this.