Chapter XIII

For another week Althea wrestled heroically and silently with the complicated problems the Dolphin presented, relying for aid on the inadequate assistance of her husband and Lemuel Gill and the sporadic visits of Peggy Davidson and the young doctor; then one morning, after passing a sleepless night, during which twinges from a rheumatic shoulder warned her of excessive fatigue, she observed at breakfast:

“I wouldn’t wonder, Asaph, but I’d have to get a woman in to help with the tea. This bein’ in all places at once ain’t provin’ as easy as you might think. With Peggy dashin’ in only haphazard I’ve nobody I can actually rely on to bear a hand.”

“Ain’t you got me an’ Lemmy?”

“To be sure I have,” amended his wife with haste. “Still, as I’ve often told you, men ain’t like women. Furthermore, we’ve no right to be draggin’ Lemuel Gill here every afternoon to tote tea.”

“Pooh! Lemuel don’t care. He might’s well be doin’ that as anythin’ else. If he warn’t at the Dolphin he’d just be moggin’ round at home weedin’ or else settin’ down on the beach with Zeke Barker. I’ve a notion he enjoys comin’ here. He’s struck up quite an acquaintance with some of the folks--that old Mr. Haverford, for instance, an’ the woman from out West that raises prize dahlias.”

“Notwithstandin’ that, we’ve no claim to pin him down to comin’ day in an’ day out,” persisted Althea. “Had I a woman to help he’d likely feel freer to stay away when he wanted to.”

“I s’pose he might,” conceded Asaph, to whom the thought of Lemmy at leisure to devote himself to horticulture while he himself toiled amid the teacups did not altogether appeal. “Still, for all that, I don’t see why we can’t pull along as we are for another spell. Ain’t we makin’ out all right?”

Althea hedged. She was too proud to confess thus early in her Dolphinic career that she was tired. Besides, fatigue was not her sole reason for the move to which she was so diplomatically leading up.

“Oh, of course we’re makin’ out,” she answered. “Still, I believe ’twould be wiser to be breakin’ in a woman. S’pose I was to be sick?”

“Lemmy an’ me could bridge the gulf, I reckon, same’s we did before.”

“You had Miss Davidson an’ the Doctor to turn to then.”

“Not at first.”

“Well, you couldn’t be goin’ on like you did for long. Folks are willin’ to take a chowder in place of tea for a joke; but when it comes to doin’ it right along they’d balk. I’m moral certain, lookin’ at it from every angle, ’twould be better to get a woman in. You see, servin’ tea with all the fuss an’ frills city folks demand ain’t like dishin’ up a bean supper at the church. I could feed a hundred people there in half the time it takes me to putter round with these mites of sandwiches, morsels of lemon, an’ cinnamon toast. Then, too, the china’s delicate to wash an’--”

“I said from the first that china was an idiotic investment,” interrupted Asaph, manifesting unwonted asperity. “If there’s any sight in the world more foolish than one of those silly teacups, thin as vanity an’ not holdin’ more’n one good swallow, I’ve yet to see it.”

“That’s what folks use.”

“Wal’, they’re jolly welcome to,” was the grim retort. “I wouldn’t be hired to have my drink turned out into any such egg-shell.”

“It may be thin--I ain’t denyin’ it is,” admitted Althea, who sensed nothing was to be gained by a display of irritation. “But for all that it seems to wear uncommon well. So far not a piece of it has been broken.”

“I know that,” bridled Asaph. “An’ why? ’Cause ever since that crockery crossed our threshold neither Lemmy nor me have drawed one comfortable breath.”

In spite of her annoyance Althea laughed.

“If I got in a woman you could,” was her instant response.

“Mebbe.”

“Besides, with a capable person to leave in the kitchen, I could keep a closer eye on what was goin’ on out front.”

“You mean you’d have more chance to visit with the people,” amended the man shrewdly.

“I mean I could be surer they were gettin’ what they wanted,” retorted Althea with chilling dignity.

Her clear-sighted husband greeted the explanation with a significant chuckle.

“Wal’, have it your own way,” said he good-humoredly. “The Dolphin’s yours to run as you please. I don’t care a hang what you do. Only where could you find a woman, should you decide to hire one? The folks in town have their hands full already, I guess, without takin’ on Dolphins an’ tea drinkin’s.”

“Oh, I shouldn’t think of engagin’ any of the village people,” sniffed Althea. “I wouldn’t take ’em at any price even if they’d come. I’d rather have somebody from outside who wouldn’t go retailin’ our business all over Belleport. I don’t care about havin’ every man, woman, an’ child from here to Provincetown knowin’ exactly how many visitors we have afternoons an’ how much money we’re makin’--though fur’s that goes the way Lemmy Gill bets with the fishermen each day on the number of folks who’ll come keeps the public pretty well informed of our doin’s.”

“Lemuel don’t harm nothin’.”

“Don’t he traipse down to the shore an’ put up actual cash with that no-account Zeke Barker about it?”

“He may do a bit of friendly jokin’ with Zeke,” admitted Asaph, cautiously.

“Friendly jokin’! Now, Asaph, do be honest. Lemmy bets with Zeke Barker; you know he does. Folks have told me so. It’s regular gamblin’--a thing that’s against my Christian principles. It oughter be against yours, too, an’ you a deacon.”

“Oh, Lemmy don’t put up much, just coppers. It’s his way of boomin’ trade.”

“I don’t see how you can be so easy goin’ an’ indulgent about Lemuel Gill, Asaph. You are never willin’ to measure him up squarely an’ condemn his sins same’s you would other people’s. Bettin’s bettin’, be it done with coppers, dimes, or dollars, an’ I don’t enjoy feelin’ me an’ my concerns are the cause of it, innocent though I am of blame. You’d oughter have conscience enough to object to it, too. But I s’pose you’d no more own Lemmy was wrong an’ take him to task than you’d cut off your head. You’re always standin’ up for him.”

Instead of denying the charge Asaph smiled blandly.

“I know it,” agreed he in a placid drawl, “an’ what’s more I figger I’ll be doin’ it to the last minute of my life. I may even be backin’ him at the judgment throne if he needs backin’.”

“But why won’t you ever admit his shortcomin’s?” interrogated Althea, impatience crisping the question.

“Admit ’em? What use would there be in that? Ain’t they there stickin’ out like sore thumbs so all the world can see ’em? But law, they don’t bother me none. Lemmy’s sins are part of him. That’s the difference twixt you an’ me. I like Lemuel as he is, faults an’ all. You, on the other hand, are continually itchin’ to cut him to another pattern.”

“Yes, I am,” snapped Althea with spirit.

“You’re silly,” droned Asaph, “an’ wastin’ your energy, for in the first place you never can do it; an’ in the second, you’re missin’ meanwhile the enjoyment you might be gettin’ out of Lemmy as he is.”

“Oh, I like Lemuel--don’t think I don’t,” his wife hastened to assert.

“I hope you do--hope so indeed. I’d feel almighty sorry if you didn’t, ’cause next to you there ain’t a bein’ on earth I set such store by as Lemuel Gill.”

Considering the case closed he took up his hat and sauntered toward the door.

“But about this woman, Asaph,” called Althea, staying him on the threshold. “You’re willin’ I should get one?”

“Certain I am if you can snare her. But I reckon ’twon’t be easy as you imagine. How are you goin’ to work to waylay anybody?”

His helpmate directed toward him a Mona Lisa smile, in which condescension and pity were blended.

“Well, to tell the truth,” responded she, “I’ve somebody in mind already. When I saw how things were goin’ I wrote up to Sister Sarah to hunt me up a person in case--”

“Oh!”

Althea ignored the innuendo contained in the monosyllable.

“I thought it would do no harm to have somebody in reserve,” continued she in an even tone. “Sarah knew of a woman who’d been actin’ as housekeeper for an invalid gentleman who lives across the street. She said she was just the caretakin’ person we wanted--capable, an’ smart as a whip.” For the first time she hesitated and nervously fingered the hem of her apron. “In fact, she’s comin’ down to see me today. I thought I might’s well look her over. It commits me to nothin’.”

“Humph!” By this time, Asaph told himself, he ought to understand Althea’s methods and cease to be surprised by her quiet way of carrying her point. Yet every time she confronted him with her perfected plans he was equally taken aback.

“Yes, she’s comin’ down from Brockton today,” his wife repeated.

“I don’t see why you troubled to ask me about havin’ her, then.”

“Now, Asaph, don’t be silly. I ain’t hired her.”

“N----o.”

“Then why get so uppish?”

“I ain’t uppish. I was just-- Is this her stoppin’ at the gate?”

“Mercy on us! I believe it must be. Well, I certainly didn’t bank on her puttin’ in her appearance so early in the day. The whole place looks as if it had been struck by lightnin’. However, if she’s comin’ here to live she may’s well see us as we are.”

She bustled to the window and peeped out through the closed blinds.

“Kinder perky an’ independent lookin’,” murmured she in accents colored with faint disappointment. “Still, looks are often deceivin’. Yes, marm, this is the Green Dolphin an’ I’m Mrs. Holmes. Come right in, won’t you? We ain’t very tidy round here yet ’cause I ain’t got the breakfast dishes washed up. You know how ’tis.”

If the sharp-eyed individual in the much-furbelowed hat and gown knew, at least no sympathetic gleam from her countenance evinced the fact. It was a hard face framed in the blackest of hair and adorned with an inquisitive nose and a mouth that came together with the precision of the slot in a penny bank.

Having swept a comprehensive glance over the interior of the room and its occupants she turned with businesslike directness to Althea.

“There are just the two of you?”

“Yes.”

“And you’d want me to cook your meals?”

“Oh, I’d help. You see--”

“Your husband has his dinners at home?”

“Yes. We--”

“Cookin’ for two ain’t much when there’s no children,” announced the woman as if thinking aloud. “I could give you your breakfast at eight. That wouldn’t get me up early an’ yet, with dinner at one, would leave me a nice long morning for work. There’d be a hot meal with meat, vegetables an’ puddin’, I s’pose; or maybe pie. I never eat fish. Supper you could have about five. Then I’d get everything washed up in time to go to the movies. I s’pose there’s a picture show in town.”

“There’s one at Sawyer’s Falls; but--”

“How far’s that?”

“Six miles.”

“Humph! It might be nearer. Still, maybe I could manage. Have you got a car?”

“No.”

“But there must be some way of gettin’ over there in the evening. Ain’t there a bus?”

“A six-seated barge goes to the Falls every night with the mail.”

“That would do,” broke in the visitor taking up the thread of her conversation. “Sundays I’d want off so I could go up to Brockton and see my brother’s family. However, that wouldn’t interfere with you much, for I’d cook you some beans an’ brown bread before leaving and you could heat ’em up. Other days I’d be on hand to turn off the morning’s work. I make it a rule never to do anything afternoons--I rest--read, write or take a nap. There,” concluded she with a swift nod, “I guess everythin’s settled. It looks as if we’d get on splendid together. I can start right in Monday an’ my wages will be--”

Asaph, who was lounging against the frame of the door regarding the stranger with a smile of quiet amusement, broke in upon her torrent of words.

“Say,” demanded he in a slow, drawling voice, “just what gave you the notion we’d get on splendid together?”

“Why--”

“An’ made you so sure we’d want you to start in Monday mornin’?”

“I understood from Mrs. Tyler--”

“An’ what led you to imagine we’d fall in with the schedule you’ve just set forth?”

Spellbound with amazement the woman subsided into silence.

“We don’t want our breakfast at eight o’clock,” went on Asaph. “We have it at six every mornin’ of our lives. Dinner’s at twelve, not one. Supper’s a sort of no-account meal an’ comes at all kinds of hours, bein’ made up chiefly of what’s left over from the Dolphin. As for your readin’ an’ sleepin’ afternoons, you don’t appear to be aware my wife’s runnin’ a tea-room an’--”

“Asaph!” ejaculated the astounded Althea.

“Well, why don’t you tell her somethin’ before she moves in bag an’ baggage an’ gets her trunk unpacked?”

“I was goin’ to soon’s I could get a chance. But I couldn’t get a word in edgewise.”

With snapping eyes the woman sprang indignantly to her feet.

“I didn’t understand from your sister, Mrs. Holmes, that I was expected to have anything to do with the tea doings.”

“Bless your heart, it’s because of the Dolphin we’re hirin’ help,” explained Asaph.

“In that case I wouldn’t consider the position--not for a moment. I couldn’t think of drudging round both morning and afternoon. Besides, the tea would be liable to drag on and make me out late evenings.”

“You couldn’t go out evenings,” said Althea. “Often the cups an’ saucers ain’t washed before eight or nine o’clock.”

As the stranger tossed her head a large jet ornament on her hat tinkled through the stillness.

“I wouldn’t take the place on any account,” repeated she, moving toward the door. “Mrs. Tyler gave me the wrong impression altogether. She told me--”

Whatever the picture the unfortunate Sarah had painted the black-haired creature in the jangling bonnet was evidently too deeply incensed to tarry and re-sketch it. Instead, muttering to herself, she sailed out of the house and down the clam-shell path like a frigate-of-war with steam up and every gun charged.

“My soul!” gasped Althea, crumpling weakly into a chair.

“Wouldn’t you know Sarah’d send you some half-cocked critter like that?” stormed Asaph. “Prob’ly she didn’t even explain what was wanted, but just aimed the hussy down here all unprimed an’ knowin’ nothin’. Sarah’s that impractical she wouldn’t think farther’n her nose. Even if the jade was good lookin’--”

“I didn’t consider her good lookin’.”

“I said even if she was,” repeated Asaph, carefully.

“She was a pert, insultin’, lazy upstart, if you want to know my opinion of her,” his wife frowned.

“I wouldn’t have her in the house for no money.”

“Nor I!”

A pause fell between them.

“Well, that’s that!” acclaimed Asaph at last. “Now what are you goin’ to do?”

“Try the other one.”

“Try the--eh?” stupidly.

“Try another woman I’ve got track of, one from down the Cape,” elucidated Althea.

Too dumbfounded to speak the man stared at her a full minute.

“Where’d you run afoul of her?” he inquired when he had got his breath.

“Through the fish-man. It’s always as well to have two strings to your bow, to my way of thinkin’; so one day when he was here I asked him did he know of anyone I could get in case it come to my hirin’ somebody, an’ he told me of a Miss Rebecca Crosby, who, he vowed, was a treasure. He said if he could snap her up before other folks did we’d be the luckiest of mortals. ’Pears the brother she’s been keepin’ house for has recently died an’ left her without a home. She ain’t ever worked out before an’ wouldn’t be doin’ it now but for circumstances. ’Course she ain’t up in city ways--wouldn’t know nothin’ about afternoon tea, for instance; but he assured me she was willin’ an’ agreeable an’ that counts for a lot.”

“From the sound I’d a hundred times rather have her than that Jezebel of Sarah’s.”

“So would I. I reckon she’s more our kind. I’ll drop a line to Enoch an’ tell him to bring her to see me the next trip he makes.”

As a result when the altruistic Enoch next made his rounds, in company with him and the cod and cunners came Rebecca Crosby, and she never went hither. One glance from Althea’s discerning eye was enough.

“She’s just the comfortable sort I shall admire to have round,” confided she to her husband. “Had I scoured the length an’ breadth of the Cape I couldn’t ’a’ found a woman more to my likin’. She actually seems made a-purpose for us. Moreover, she’s full as pleased with the idea of comin’ as I am with havin’ her. Wages are of less account in her estimation than the securin’ of a good home, an’ we certainly can give her that.”

Asaph fingered the chain of his big silver watch.

“You don’t think you’re rushin’ in a mite hurriedly, do you?” he mildly suggested.

“No!” was the assured answer. “I know what I want when I see it. It don’t take me long to make up my mind. In my opinion we’re blest of heaven to get such a person. You’ll be sayin’ so yourself before the week is out.”

Daring as was the prophecy, it was not a whit too sanguine, for the span of days Althea had set apart had not passed ere Asaph was joining with his better half and chanting the praises of Rebecca. That a stranger could enter their doors and so speedily adapt herself to the new environment seemed incredible. Without a vestige of intrusiveness her quick intelligence fathomed the ins and outs not only of the Holmes’s menage, but of its master and mistress. Her enjoyment of harmless gossip delighted Althea as did also her interest in the fashions and her feminine pleasure in a romance. Ah, here was a companion after her own heart! Together they chatted of love affairs and hair dressing; of ailments and crocheted lace; and while they compared notes the routine of the Dolphin slipped lightly and airily along.

Nor were Rebecca’s talents exhausted in cake and sandwich making. In the remote days of her youth she had taught school, and in consequence an alert, well-ordered mind stored with much of lasting value had been bequeathed her. Hence she was able to discuss with Asaph, Webster, Clay, and Jefferson, and touch his books with a hand as reverent as his own. As for flowers--why, she had always grown them, she modestly confessed.

Incidentally, with unobtrusive tact, she smoothed away many a rough corner in the home and by her ready wit prevented friction.

For there was no denying that life with a horticulturist had its drawbacks.

“Seems’s if I never lift a foot that I don’t stumble over some plant that’s bein’ nursed along under a flower-pot, or a starch box filled with rootin’ geraniums,” complained Althea to her newly acquired confidante. “Gardenin’ is awful tryin’, take it by an’ large. Asaph’s as good a husband as ever was born. Don’t think for a minute I’m malignin’ him. But his catalogues, clippin’s an’ fertilizer drive me ’most beyond endurance. There’s days I could pitch ’em all into the sea. I no mor’n get the shed tidied up than he’s out there again siftin’ more sand, stirrin’ together more soot an’ wood ashes. As for them tins full of poison, it raises my hair to contemplate ’em.”

Sighing, she took up another slice of bread and began to butter it.

“There’s scarce a corner of this house that ain’t stuffed full of articles on how to grow artichokes or raise mushrooms in the cellar. Let a door open an’ away they blow. Now Asaph ain’t ever goin’ to do nothin’ with artichokes. He ain’t ever seen one, to begin with; an’ were he to he’d never eat it. An’ the same’s true of mushrooms. Still, he can’t resist gatherin’ together every word that’s written about ’em. It’s terrible tryin’. I’ve got him trained now so he puts whatever he cuts out in the table drawer an’ when I spy it bulgin’ so it won’t shut, I simply clear it out an’ cart all that’s in it to the attic. He seldom notices it’s been moved. Fur’s I can see, he never gives the cuttin’s a second glance, though, to be sure, I occasionally hear him murmurin’ of pastin’ ’em into books.”

Rebecca smiled but maintained silence. She possessed the rare gift of looking sympathetic yet never taking sides.

“An’ it’s the same with the seed catalogues,” went on Althea, reaching for another loaf of bread. “He an’ Lemmy Gill send all over the face of the earth for ’em an’ read ’em threadbare; then they collect an’ collect on the sittin’-room table. I wait till the pile gets so high I can’t see the lamp over the top of ’em, an’ then up the whole batch goes to the garret. I used to scold about them an’ the clippin’s when I first got married; but gradually I learned better. I found there was no makin’ Asaph over. Furthermore, hectorin’ as he was his sins were harmless. I decided a husband might be doin’ far worse things. Every man, I reckon, has some faults--every woman, too, for that matter. It’s far more peaceable to get on with ’em than to keep arguin’ about ’em all the time.”

Cordially Rebecca nodded. She did nothing more at the moment. But one day not long afterward she casually suggested:

“Why don’t you bring that box of perennials round under my bedroom window, Mr. Holmes? There’s fine sunshine there an’ they’ll be less liable to get stepped on or tipped over than on the back stoop.”

Gratefully Asaph welcomed the plan.

How pleasant to find somebody interested in the well-being of his beloved progeny!

As for Rebecca’s passion for seed catalogues, it almost equalled his own! With what marvellous dispatch and understanding she grouped together the spring and the fall volumes and neatly tied them up! Ah, the price of this woman was above rubies!

“I don’t see how we ever managed ’fore ’Becca came,” said the simple-minded Asaph to his wife after a day in which the virtues of this paragon had shone with especial resplendence.

“Nor I,” echoed Althea.