Chapter V: Part 5

“My Lord alive,” cried Aunt Mary, turning her gaze upwards, “am I expected to go alone all that way to the top?”

“It’ll pay you to keep on to the top,” screamed Clover; “you’ll have, comparatively speaking, very little fun if you hang on to the ladder all day—and you’ll get so wet too.”

“There’s more room at the top,” cried Mitchell, “there’s always room at the top, Miss Watkins. Put yourself in the place of any young man entering a profession and struggle bravely upwards, bearing ever in—”

“Oh, I never can,” said Aunt Mary, recoiling abruptly; “I never could climb trees when I was little—I never had no grip in my legs—and I just know I can’t. It’s too high. An’ it looks slippery. An’ I don’t want to, anyhow.”

“What rot!” yelled Jack, “the very idea! Why, Aunt Mary, you know you can skin up there just like a cat if you only make up your mind to it. Here, Mitchell, give her a boost and I’ll plant her feet firmly. Now—have you got hold of the ropes, Aunt Mary?”

“Oh, mercy—on—me!” wailed Aunt Mary, “the yacht is turnin’ a-round an’ the harder I pull the faster it turns.”

“Catch her from above, Burr,” Clover called excitedly; “hook her with anything if you can’t reach her with your hand.”

“Oh, my cap!” shrieked poor Aunt Mary, and the cap went off and she went on up and was landed safe above.

“How on the chart do you suppose we’ll ever unload her?” Jack asked, wide-eyed, as he swung himself quickly after her.

“What man hath done man can do,” quoted Mitchell sententiously, following his lead.

“But no man ever unloaded Aunt Mary,” Clover reminded him, as they brought up the rear.

Then they were all on deck, a chair was brought for the honored guest, and Mitchell introduced his sailing-master who had been drawn to gaze upon the rather novel manner in which she had been brought aboard.

“I want Miss Watkins to have the sail of her life, Renfew,” said Mitchell. “We aren’t coming back until night.”

“We’ll have sail enough sure, sir,” said Renfew, touching his cap, and then he walked away and the work of starting off began. A tug had been engaged to tow them out into the breeze and Jack thought it would be nice to show Aunt Mary around while they were being meandered through coal barges, etc. They went below and Aunt Mary saw everything with a most flattering interest.

“I d’n know but what I’d enjoy a little yacht of my own,” she said to Mitchell. “I think it’s so amusin’ the way everythin’ turns over into suthin’ else. I suppose Joshua could learn to sail me—I wouldn’t want to trust no new man, I know.”

“Why, of course,” said Jack, “and we could all come and visit you, Aunt Mary.”

Aunt Mary smiled hospitably.

“I’d be glad to see you all any day,” she said cordially; “and I shall have a hole in the bottom of the boat for people to go in and out of, and a nice staircase down to it, so you needn’t mind the notion of how you’ll get on and off.”

They all laughed and continued the tour below and Aunt Mary grew more and more enthusiastic for quite a while. She liked the kitchen and she liked the dining-room. She thought the arrangement for keeping the table level most ingenious. Mitchell took her into the main cabin and told her that that was hers for the day. On the dresser was a photograph of the “Lady Belle” framed in silver, which the young host presented to his guest as a souvenir of the “voyage.”

Aunt Mary’s pleasure was at its height. Oh, the pity of Fate which makes the apex of everything so very limited as to standing room! Three minutes after the presentation and acceptation of the photograph Aunt Mary’s glance became suddenly vague, and then especially piercing.

“What makes this up and down feeling?” she asked Mitchell.

“What up and down feeling?” he asked, secure in the good conscience and pure living of an oatmeal breakfast. “I don’t feel up and down.”

“I do,” said Aunt Mary abruptly; “I want to be somewhere else.”

“You want to be on deck,” said Burnett, suddenly emerging from somewhere; “I know the symptoms. I always have ’em. Come on. And when we get up there, I’ll collar Jack for urging those six last griddle cakes on me this morning.”

“I ain’t sure I want to be on deck,” said Aunt Mary; “dear me—I feel as if I wasn’t sure of anythin’.”

“What did I tell you?” said Burnett to Mitchell; “it’s blowing fresh and neither she nor I ought to have come. You know me when it blows.”

“Shut up,” said Mitchell, hurrying Aunt Mary up the companion-way and shoving her into one chair and her feet into another; “there, Miss Watkins, you’re all right now, aren’t you?”

“What’s the matter?” said Jack, coming from somewhere aloft or astern. “Heaven bless me, what ails you, Aunt Mary?”

“I don’t wonder I’m pale,” said Aunt Mary faintly, “oh—oh—”

“We must put our heads together,” said Burnett, taking a drink from a flask that he took out of his pocket; “I must soon put my head on something, and your aunt looks to me to feel the same way. Mitchell, why did you let me forget that vow I made last time to never come again?”

“Your vows to never do things again are about as stable as your present hold on an upright position,” said Clover, laying a steadying hand upon his friend’s waveringness. “Sit down, little boy, sit down.”

Burnett sat down, Mitchell smiled, Jack laughed, and Aunt Mary groaned.

The boat was rising and falling rapidly now, and as she ran further and further out into the ever freshening wind she kept on rising and falling yet more rapidly. The more motion there was the more Aunt Mary seemed to sift down in her two chairs.

“We’d better put back,” said Jack; “this won’t do, you know. How do you feel now, Aunt Mary?” he added, leaning over her.

Aunt Mary opened her eyes and looked at him but made no reply.

“Ask me how I feel, if you dare,” said Burnett, from where his chair was drawn up not far away. “I couldn’t kill you just now, but I will some day I promise you.”

He was very white and had a look about his mouth that showed that he meant what he said.

Some bells rang somewhere.

“That’s dinner,” exclaimed Clover.

Aunt Mary gave a piercing cry.

“Oh, take me somewhere else,” she said, throwing her hands up to her face; “somewhere where there’ll never be nothin’ to eat again. I—I can’t bear to hear about eatin’.”

“I’m going to take her down into one of the cabins,” said Jack hastily, “she belongs in bed.”

“No, turn back the carpet and lay me in the bath-tub,” almost sobbed the poor victim. “I don’t feel like I could get flat enough anywhere else.”

“She has the proper spirit,” said Burnett faintly, “only I don’t feel as if I could get flat enough anywhere at all. What in the name of the Great Pyramid ever possessed me to come?”

Mitchell rose quickly to his feet.

“You put your aunt to bed, Jack,” he said, “and I’ll put my yacht to backing. This expedition is expeditiously heading on to what might be termed a failure. I can see that, even if we’re only in a Sound.”

“When do you suppose we’ll get back?” the nephew asked anxiously.

“About four o’clock, if we don’t lose time by having to tack.”

“I didn’t quite catch all that,” said Aunt Mary, “but I knew suthin’ was loose all along. I felt it inside of me right off at first. And ever since, too.”

Jack gathered her up in his arms and bore her tenderly away to the beautiful main cabin.

“I wanted to live to change my will,” she said sadly, as he laid her down, “but somehow I don’t seem to care for nothin’ no more.”

He kissed her hand.

“They say being seasick is awfully _good_ for people, Aunt Mary,” he yelled contritely.

Aunt Mary opened her eyes.

“John Watkins, Jr., Denham,” she said, “if you say ‘food’ to me again _ever_, I’ll never leave you a penny—so there!”

Jack went away and left her.

“Come on to dinner, Burnett,” Clover called hilariously, “there’s liver with little bits of bacon—your favorite dish.”

Burnett snarled the weakest kind of a snarl.

“I thought I’d suffered enough for one year last month,” he murmured in a voice too low to be heard, and then he knew himself to be alone on deck.

Down in the little dining-saloon the dishes were hopping merrily back and forth and an agreeable odor of agreeable viands filled the air. Clover and Jack sat down opposite their host and they all three ate and drank with a zest that knew no breaking waves nor sad effects.

“Here’s to our aunt,” said Clover gayly, as the first course went around; “of course, we all love her for Jack’s sake, but at the same time I offer two to odds that it is a pleasure to converse in under tones occasionally. Who takes?”

“Aunt Mary being laid upon her bed,” said Mitchell, “we will next proceed to lay the motion of our honorable friend upon the table. We regret Aunt Mary’s ill-health while we drink to her good—quotation marks under the latter word. Aunt Mary!—and may she arise and prosper all the way down into the launch again.”

“I’m troubled about her, really,” said Jack soberly; “we ought to have brought someone to look out for her.”

“The maid,” cried Mitchell, “the dainty, adorable maid! Here’s to Janice and—” his speech was brought to a sudden end by his two guests nearly disappearing under the table.

Jack started up.

“Ginger! Did you feel that?” he asked.

“That’s nothing,” said Mitchell, calmly replacing the water-carafe which in the excitement of the moment he had clasped to his bosom; “it’s the waves which are rising to the occasion—that’s all.” But Jack had hurried out.

He found poor Aunt Mary writhing in an agony of misery. “Oh—oh—” she cried, “I want to be still—I’m too much tipped—and all the wrong way! I want to lay smooth—and I stand on my head—all the—”

“We’re going back,” said Jack, striving to soothe her; “lie still, Aunt Mary, and we’ll soon get there. Do you want some camphor to smell?”

“I don’t feel up to smellin’,” wailed Aunt Mary, “I don’t feel up to anythin’. Go ’way. Right off.”

Jack went on deck. He found Burnett stretched pale and green upon the chairs their lady guest had vacated.

“If you speak to me again,” he said, in halting accents, “I’ll never speak to you again. Get out.”

Jack went back to his place at dinner.

“How are they?” asked Clover.

“I don’t know,” he said quietly, “but there’s a big storm coming up. The sky’s all dark blue and it looks bad.”

“I don’t care,” said Mitchell, sawing into the game with vigor; “if we go down we go down with Aunt Mary and if I were Uncle Mary I wouldn’t feel happier and safer as to all concerned. The ship that bore Cæsar and his fortune had nothing at all to bear compared to this which bears Jack and his. Here’s to Jack and his fortune, and may we all survive the dark blue sky.”

“I tell you it’s serious,” said Jack. As he spoke another ominous heaving set the bottles tipping and nearly sent Clover backwards.

“And I’m serious,” exclaimed Mitchell. “I’m always serious only I never can get any girl to believe it. Here’s to me, and may I grow more and more serious each—”

A tremendous wave bore the yacht upright and then let her fall on her forelegs again. Clover went over backwards and the dish of peas to which he had just been helping himself followed after.

“You didn’t say ‘excuse me’ when you left the table,” said Mitchell, whom the law of gravitation had suddenly raised to a pinnacle from which he viewed his friends with mirthful scorn; “and if you’ve hurt yourself it must be a judgment on you for leaving the table without saying ‘excuse me.’ Here’s to Clover, who has a judgment and a dish of peas served on him at the same time for leaving the table without saying ‘excuse me.’”

The sailing-master appeared at the door, his cap in his hand.

“I beg your pardon, sir,” he said respectfully, “but I fear it’s impossible to put back. We can’t turn without getting into the trough of the sea.”

“All right, go ahead then,” said Mitchell; “go where we must go, and do what you’ve got to do. My motto is _veni, vidi, vici_, which freely translated means I can sleep asea when I can’t sleep ashore.”

“But Aunt Mary?” cried Jack blankly.

“She’s all right,” said Mitchell; “she’ll soon reach the cold burnt toast stage and when she reaches the stage we’ll all welcome her into any chorus. Here’s to choruses in general and one chorus girl in particular. I haven’t met her yet, but I shall know her when I do, for she will look at me. Up to now they’ve all looked elsewhere and at other men. If my fortune was only in my face it might draw some interest, but—”

“Lady Belle” careened violently and Clover went over backwards for the second time with much in his wake.

“Oh, I say,” said Mitchell, rising in disgust, “if you want everything on the table at once why take it. Only I’m going on deck. After you’ve bathed in the gravy you can have it. Ditto the other liquids. Jack and I are going up to dance a hornpipe and sing for Burnett. He looked rather ennuyéd to me when we came down.”

Along toward eight o’clock that night “Lady Belle” anchored somewhere in the Sound and tugged vigorously at her cables all night.

With the dawn she headed back towards New York.

“As a success my entertainment has been a failure,” said Mitchell to Jack as they walked up and down the deck after breakfast; “but into each life some rain must fall, and I offer myself as a sacrificial background to Aunt Mary’s glowing, living pictures of New York.”

“I wish you hadn’t, though,” said Jack; “she’ll never want a yacht of her own now. And how under Scorpion are we ever going to land her?”

“In a sheet, my able-bodied young friend, in a sheet,” said Mitchell clapping him on the back. “Don’t you know the ‘Weigh the Baby’ game? It may double her up a bit, but the redoubtable Janice will straighten her out again. Here’s to the sheet, be it a wet sheet, a main sheet, or a sheet with your Aunt Mary tied up in it.”

Mitchell was as good as his word and they landed Aunt Mary in a sheet. The very harbor-tugs stopped puffing and stood open-mouthed to stare at the performance, but it was an unalloyed success, and Aunt Mary was gotten onto dry land at last.

“I don’t want to do nothin’ for a day or two,” she said, as they drove to the house.

Janice had the bed open, and a hot-water bottle down where Aunt Mary’s feet might be expected, and all sorts of comfort ready to hand.

“I’m so glad to see you safe back,” she said, almost weeping.

“I don’t believe it’s broke,” said Aunt Mary, “but you might look and see. Oh, Granite—I—” she stopped and looked an unutterable meaning.

“It stormed, didn’t it?” said the maid.

“Stormed!” said Aunt Mary. “I guess it did storm. I guess it hurricaned. I know it did. I’m sure of it.”

“But you’re safe now,” said the girl, tucking her up as snugly as if she had been an infant in arms.

“Yes, I’m safe now,” said Aunt Mary, “but—” she looked very earnest—“but, oh, my Granite, how I did need that white fuzzy stuff to drink this morning. I never wanted nothin’ so bad in all my life afore.”

Janice stood by the bed, her face full of regret that Aunt Mary had known any aching void.

Aunt Mary grew yet more earnest.

“Granite,” she said, “you mind what I tell you. That ought to be advertised. I sh’d think you could patent it. Folks ought to know about it.”

Then she laid herself out in bed. “My heavens alive!” she sighed sweetly, “there’s nothin’ like home. Not anywhere—not nowhere!”

Chapter Sixteen A Reposeful Interval

The next date upon the little gold and ivory memorandum card which hung beside Aunt Mary’s watch was that set for Burnett’s picnic, but its dawning found both host and guest too much attached to their beds to desire any fêtes champêtre just then.

Burnett was in that very weak state which follows in the immediate wake of only too many yachts,—and Aunt Mary was sleeping one of her long drawn out and utterly restorative sleeps.

Jack went in and looked at her.

“It did storm awfully,” he said to Janice, who was sitting by the window. The maid just smiled, nodded, and laid her finger on her lip. She never encouraged conversation when her charge was reposing.

Jack went softly out and turned his steps toward the room of the other wreck.

“Well, how are stocks to-day?” he asked cheerfully on entering.

Burnett was stretched out pillowless and looked black under his hollow eyes. But he appeared to be on the road to recovery.

“Jack,” he said seriously, “what in thunder makes me always so ready to go on the water? I should think after a while I’d learn a thing or two.”

Jack leaned his elbows on the high carved footboard and returned his friend’s look with one of equal seriousness.

“What makes all of us do lots of things?” he asked. “Why don’t we all learn?”

Burnett sighed.

“That’s a fact; why don’t we?” he said weakly. And then he shut his eyes again and turned his back to his caller.

Jack went down to lunch. Clover and Mitchell were playing cards in the library.

“Well, how is the hospital?” Clover asked, looking up while he shuffled the pack.

“Never mind about Burnett,” said Mitchell, “but do relieve my mind about Aunt Mary. Is the one sheet still taking effect, or has she begun to rally on a diet of two?”

“She’s asleep,” said the nephew.

“God bless her slumber,” declared Clover piously. “I very much approve of Aunt Mary asleep. When our dearly beloved aunt sleeps we know we’ve got her and we don’t have to yell. Shall I deal for three?”

“They are bringing up lunch,” said the latest arrival,—“no time to begin a hand. Better stack guns for the present.”

“So say I,” said Mitchell, “with me everything goes down when lunch comes up. It’s quite the reverse with Burnett, isn’t it?” He laughed brutally at his own wit.

“To think how enthusiastic Burr was,” said Clover, evening the cards preparatory to slipping them into their holder on the side of the table. “He’s always so enthusiastic and he’s always so sick. In his place I should feel that, if a buoyant nature is a virtue, I didn’t get much reward.”

The gong sounded just then, and they all went down to lunch, not at all saddened by the sight of their comrade’s empty chair.

“Now, what are we going to do next?” Clover demanded as they finished the bouillon.

“Have a meat course, I suppose,” said Mitchell.

“I don’t mean that; I mean, what are we going to do next with Aunt Mary?”

“She hasn’t but two days more,” said Jack meditatively. “Of course—even if she was all chipper—this storm has knocked any picnic endways.”

“I am not an ardent upholder of picnics, anyhow,” said Mitchell. “They require a constant sitting down on the ground and getting up from the ground to which I find our respected aunt very far from being equal. Burnett mentioned that we should go to the scene on a coach. That also did not meet my approval. Going anywhere on a coach requires a constant getting up on the coach and getting down from the coach to which I also consider the lady unequal. The events of yesterday have left a deep impression on my mind. I—”

“Go on and carve,” interrupted Clover, “or else shove me the platter. I’m hungry.”

“So’m I,” said a voice at the door. A weak voice—but one that showed decision in its tone.

They looked up and saw Burnett, dressed in a pink silk negligée with flowing sleeves.

“I’m ravenous,” he exclaimed explanatorily. “I haven’t had anything since day before yesterday at breakfast. I didn’t know I wanted anything till I smelt it,—then I dressed and came down.”

“How sweet you look,” said Clover. “The effect of your pajama cuffs and collar where one greedily expects curves and contour is lovely. Where did you find that bath-robe?”

“In the bureau drawer,” said Burnett. “It appeared to have been hastily shoved in there some time. I would have thought that it was a woman’s something-or-other, only I found one of Jack’s cards in the pocket.”

They all began to laugh—Clover and Mitchell more heartily than the owner of the card.

“Sit down,” said Mitchell finally with great cordiality. “You may as well sit down while they mess you up some weak tea and wet toast.”

“Tea and toast?” cried the one in pink. “I’m good for dinner. _Um Gotteswillen_, what do you suppose I came down for?”

“I wasn’t sure,” said his friend mildly; “you must admit yourself that your attire is misleading. My book on social etiquette says nothing as to when it is correct to wear a pink silk robe over blue and white striped pajamas. However, there’s no denying your presence, and what can’t be denied must be supplied, so what will you have?”

“Everything.”

Mitchell dived into the edibles generally and Burnett’s void was provided with fulfillment.

“We were talking about Aunt Mary,” Clover said presently. “We were saying that neither you nor she would be up to a coach or down to a picnic for one while.”

“Oh, I don’t know,” said Burnett. “I feel up to pretty nearly anything now that I can eat again. Pass over the horseradish, will you?”

“You’re one thing, my sweet pink friend,” said Clover gently, “but Aunt Mary’s another. I’m not saying that New York has not had a wonderfully Brown-Sequardesque effect on her, but I am saying that if she is to be raised and lowered frequently, I want to travel with a portable crane.”

“Hum, hum, hum!” cried Jack. “May I just ask who did most of the heavy labor of Aunt Mary yesterday?—As the man in the opera sings twenty times with the whole chorus to back him—‘’Twas I, ’twas I, ’twas I, ’twas I—’”

“Hand over the toast, Clover,” said Burnett. “I don’t care who it was—it was a success anyhow, for she’s upstairs and still alive, and I say she’d enjoy coaching out Riverside way, and—” he choked.

“Slap him anywhere,” said Mitchell. “On his mouth would be the proper place. Such poor manners,—coming down to a company lunch in another man’s bath-robe and then trying to preach and eat dry toast at once.”

Burnett gasped and recovered.

“There,” said Clover, who had risen to administer the proposed slap, “he’s off our minds and we may again pick up Aunt Mary and put her back on.”

“We want to send her home in a blaze of glory,” said Jack thoughtfully. “I want her to feel that the fun ran straight through.”

“That’s just what I mean,” interposed his particular friend; “we want her to go home on the wings of a giant cracker, so to speak.”

“How would it do,” said Clover suddenly, “to just make a night of it and take her along? Stock up, stack up, and ho! for it. You all know the kind of a time I mean.”

“Clover,” said Jack gravely, “does it occur to you that Aunt Mary belongs to me and that I have a personal interest in keeping her alive?”

“Nothing ever occurs to him,” said Mitchell. “Occasionally an idea bangs up against him inadvertently, and as it splinters a sliver or two penetrate his head—that’s all.”

“I don’t see why the last sliver he felt wasn’t to the point,” said Burnett, turning the cream jug upside down as he spoke. “I think she’d enjoy it of all things. She enjoys everything so. I’ll guarantee that when she gets back home she’ll even enjoy the yachting trip. Lots of people are made like that. In the winter I always enjoy yachting, myself. Pass me the hot bread.”

“Burnett,” said Mitchell warmly, “I wish that you would remember that a collapse invariably follows an inflated market.”

“Is it Aunt Mary who is on the market, or myself?”

“You.”

“Oh, the rule is reversed in my case—the collapse went first. I’m only inflating up to the usual limit again. Is there any gravy left?”

“No, there isn’t,” said Clover, looking in the dish, “there isn’t much of anything left.”

“Let’s go to the library,” said Mitchell, rising abruptly. “It always makes me ill to see goose-stuffing before Thanksgiving. Come on.”

“I’m done,” said Burnett, springing up and winding his lacey draperies about his manly form. “Come on yourself; and once settled and smoking, let us canvass the question and agree with Clover.”

“You know there are nights about town and nights about town,” said Clover, as they climbed the staircase. “I do not anticipate that Aunt Mary will bring up with a round turn in the police station, as her young relative once did.”

“Well, that’s some comfort,” said Mitchell. “I did not feel sure as to just where you did mean her to bring up. You will perhaps allow me to remark that making a night of it with Aunt Mary in tow is a subject that really is provocative of mature reflection. Making a night of it is a frothy sort of a proposition in which our beloved aunty may not beat up to quite the buoyancy of you and me.”

As he finished this sage remark they all re-entered the library and grouped themselves around the table of smoking things.

“That’s what I say,” said Jack. “I think she’s much more likely to beat out than to beat up—I must say.”

“I’ll bet you she doesn’t,” cried Burnett eagerly. “I’ll bet five dollars that she doesn’t.”

“I declare,” said Clover, “what a thing a backer is to be sure. I feel positive that Aunt Mary will go through with it now. I had my doubts before, but never now. Six to five on Aunt Mary for the Three-year-old Stakes.”

“The best way is to hit a happy medium,” said Mitchell thoughtfully, scratching a match for the lighting of his new-rolled cigarette. “I think the wisest thing would be for us just to take Aunt Mary and sally forth and then keep it up until she must be put to bed. What say?”

“Well,” said Jack, reflectively, “I don’t suppose that taking it that way, it would really be any worse than the other nights—”

“Worse!” cried Clover. “Hear him!—slandering those brilliant occasions, everyone of which is a jewel in the crown of Aunt Mary’s bonnet.”

“We’ll begin by dining out,” said Burnett. “I’ll give the dinner. One of the souvenir kind of affairs. A white mouse for every man and a canary bird for the lady. We’ll have a private room and speeches and I’ll get megaphones so we can make her hear without bustin’.”

“My dear boy,” said Mitchell, “where is this private room to be in which the party can converse through megaphones? I had two deaf uncles once who played cribbage with megaphones, but they were influential and the rest of the family were poor. Circumstances alter cases. I ask again where you can get a private dining-room for the use of five people and four megaphones?”

“I’ll see,” said Burnett; “I wish,” he added irritably, “that you’d wait until I finished before beginning to smash in like that, you knock everything out of my head.”

“It’ll do you good to have a little something knocked out of you,” said Mitchell gently. “It may enlarge your premises, give you a spare room somewhere, so to speak. I should think that you’d need some spare room somewhere after such a breakfast.”

“I’ll tell you what I think;” said Clover. “I think it’s a great scheme. It’s a sort of pull-in-and-out, field-glass species of idea. We can develop it or we can shut it off; in other words, we can parade Aunt Mary or bring her home just when we darn please.”

“That’s what I said,” said Burnett. “Begin with my dinner, white mice and all, and when all is going just let it slide until it seems about time to slide off.”

“Yes,” said Mitchell dryly, “it’s always a good plan to slide on until you slide off. It would be so easy to reverse the game.”

“And then, too,—” began Burnett.

“Excuse me,” said a voice at the door,—a woman’s voice this time.

It was Janice, very pretty in her black dress and white decorations, hands in pockets, smile on lips.

“What’s up now?” the last speaker interrupted himself to ask, “Aunt Mary?”

“No, she’s not up,” said the maid; “but she’s awake and wants to know about the picnic.”

“There, what did I say!” cried Burnett; “isn’t she a hero? I tell you Aunt Mary’d fight in the last ditch—she’d never surrender! She’s one of those dead-at-the-gun chaps. I’m proud to think we have known the companionship of joint yachting results.”

“She says she feels as well as ever,” said Janice, opening her eyes a trifle as she noted Burnett’s pink silk negligée, “and wishes to know when you want to start.”

“Bravo,” said Mitchell; “I, too, am fired by this exposition of pluck. I like spirit. She reminds me of the horse who was turned out to grass and then suddenly broke the world’s record.”

“What horse was that?” asked Burnett.

“Pegasus,” said Mitchell cruelly; “I didn’t say what kind of a record he broke, did I?”

“What shall I tell Miss Watkins?” asked the maid.

Jack, who had risen at her entrance and gone to the window, faced around here and said:

“Tell her that if she’ll dress we’ll go out bonnet-shooting and afterwards drive in the park.”

Janice hesitated.

“She will surely ask where you are to dine,” said she, half-smiling.

Jack looked at the crowd.

“Fellows,” he said, “we must save up for to-morrow’s blow-out; suppose you let Mitchell and me dine Aunt Mary somewhere very tranquilly to-night and we’ll get her home by eleven.”

“Yes, do,” said Janice, with sudden earnest entreaty. “Honestly, there is a limit.”

“Of course, there is a limit,” said Mitchell. “Even cities have their limits. This one tried to be an exception, but San Francisco yelled ‘Keep off’ and she drew in her claws again. Aunt Mary, possessing many points in common with New York, also possesses that. She has limits. Her limits took in more than we bargained for,—for they have taken us into the bargain. Still they are there, and we bow to necessity. A cheerful drive, a quiet tea, early to bed. And _pax vobiscum_.”

“No wonder,” said Burnett, “it’s easy for you to agree when you’re to be one of the dinner party.” “I don’t mind being left out,” said Clover contentedly. “I shall sit on the sofa and whisper to ‘the one behind.’ Whispering is an art that I have almost forgotten, but inspired by that pink—”

“Then I’ll tell Miss Watkins to dress for the going out,” said Janice, pointedly addressing herself to Jack.

“Yes, please do.”

The maid left the room and went upstairs. Aunt Mary was tossing about on her pillow.

“Well, what’s it to be?” she asked instantly.

“The storm has made it too wet to picnic,” replied Janice. “Mr. Denham wants to take you to drive and afterwards you and Mr. Mitchell and he are to dine—”

“And Burnett and Clover?” cried Aunt Mary in appalled interruption; “where are they goin’?”

“Really, I don’t know.”

“I don’t like the idea,” said Aunt Mary; “we’d ought to all be together. I never did approve of splittin’ up in small parties. Did Jack say anythin’ about my gettin’ another bonnet?”

“Yes, he thought that you would go to a milliner first.”

“I don’t know about lookin’ sillier,” said Aunt Mary. “Strikes me a woman can’t look more foolish than she does without a bonnet. However, I don’t feel like makin’ a fuss over anythin’ to-day. I’ve had a good rest and I feel fine. I’ll dress and go out with Jack, an’ I know one thing, I’ll enjoy every minute I can, for this week is goin’ like lightnin’ and when it’s over—well, you never saw Lucinda, so it’s no use tryin’ to make you understand, but—” she drew a long breath and shook her head meaningly.

Janice did not reply. She busied herself with the cares of the toilet of her mistress, and when that was complete the carriage was summoned for the shopping tour.

Jack saw that the bonnet was attended to first of all and then they went to another store and purchased a scarf pin for Joshua and a workbox for Lucinda. After that Aunt Mary decided that she wanted her four friends each to have a souvenir of her visit, so she insisted upon being conducted to that gorgeous establishment which is lighted with diamonds instead of electricity and ordered four dressing-cases to be constructed, everything with gold tops, to be engraved with the proper initials and also the inscription, “from M.W. in memory of N.Y.” Jack rather protested at this, asking her if she realized what the engraving would come to.

“I don’t know,” said Aunt Mary recklessly and lavishly. “I don’t care what it comes to either. It’s comin’ to me, anyhow, ain’t it? I rather think so. Seems likely.”

The clerk took down the order, and then as he was ushering them door-wards he fell by the wayside and craved permission to show some tiaras of emeralds and some pearl dog-collars. Jack rebelled.

“You don’t want any of those,” he exclaimed, trying to propel her by.

“I ain’t so sure,” said Aunt Mary. “I might have a dog some day.”

But her nephew got her back into their conveyance, and they drove away. It was so late that they could not consider the park and so had to make a tour of Fifth Avenue to use up the time left before dinner. Then when they headed toward the café they were delighted to observe Mitchell awaiting them just where he was to have been.

“I see him,” said Aunt Mary. “My! I’d know him as far off as I’d know anybody.” But then she sighed. “I wish the others were there, too,” she said sadly; “seems awful—just three of us.”

The dinner which followed echoed her sentiment. It was a very nice dinner, but painfully quiet, and Aunt Mary grew very restless.

“Seems like wastin’ time, anyhow,” she said uneasily. “I don’t see why the others didn’t come. Well, can’t we go to Coney Island or the Statue of Liberty or somewhere when we’re through?”

Mitchell looked at Jack.

“Why, you see, Aunt Mary,” the latter promptly shrieked, “we thought we’d be good and go home early and sort of rest up to-night so as to have a high old time to-morrow.”

Aunt Mary’s face, which had fallen during the first part of their speech, brightened up at the last words.

“What are we goin’ to do?” she inquired with unfeigned interest.

“Burnett’s going to give us a dinner,” Jack answered, “and then afterwards we’re going to help you see the town.”

“Oh!” said Aunt Mary. A pleasant gleam fled over her face.

“I never was a great believer in bein’ out nights,” she said, “but I guess I’ll make an exception to-morrow. I might as well be doin’ that as anythin’, I presume. Maybe better—very likely better.”

“Oh, very much better,” said Mitchell. “It is the exceptions that furnish all the oil in life’s machinery. The exceptions not only generally prove too much for the rule, but they also generally prevent the rule from proving too much for us. They—”

“But I don’t see why we couldn’t go to two or three vaudevilles to-night, too,” said the old lady, suddenly. “I feel so sort of ready-for-anythin’.”

“You always feel that way, Miss Watkins,” screamed Mitchell. “It is we that are the blind and the halt. You are ever fresh, but we falter and faint. You see it’s you that go out, but it’s we that you get back. You—”

“We could go to one vaudeville, anyway,” said Aunt Mary abstractedly; “an’ if we saw any places that looked lively we could stop a few minutes there on our way back. I’ve never been into lots of things here.”

Jack looked at Mitchell this time.

“I’m sorry, Miss Watkins,” he roared, “but _I’ll_ have to go home, anyhow. You see, I’m not used to the lively life which has been enlivening us all this week and, being weakly in my knees, needs must look out.”

Aunt Mary looked very disappointed.

“Then Jack and I’ll go, too,” she said, “but oh! dear, I do hate to waste my stay in the city sleepin’ so much. I can sleep all I want after I get home, but—” she paused, and then said with deep feeling, “Well, you don’t understand about Lucinda an’ so you don’t understand about anythin’.”

Both the young men felt truly regretful as they put her into the carriage for the return trip. Her deep enjoyment was so genuine and naive that they sympathized with her feelings when cut off from it.

But it was best that this one night should pass unimproved, and so all five threw themselves into their respective beds with equal zest and slept—and slept—and slept.

Chapter Seventeen Aunt Mary’s Night About Town

The next day came up out of the ocean fair and warm, and when it drew toward later afternoon no more propitious night for setting forth ever happened.

It was undeniably a night to be remembered. And Aunt Mary’s entertainers drew in deep breaths as they girded themselves for the conflict. They certainly intended to do themselves proud and on top of all the lesser “times of her life” to pile the one pre-eminent which should rest pre-eminent forever. Aunt Mary had been gay in the first part of the week,—gayer and gayer as the week progressed, but that final crowning night was indubitably the gayest of all. If you doubt this read on—read on—and be convinced.

They began with Burnett’s dinner in the private room. No matter where the private room was, for it really wasn’t a private room at all—it was a suite of rooms borrowed and arranged especially for that one occasion. They gathered there at eight o’clock and began with oysters served on a large brass tray in a half-dim Turkish room where incense sticks burned about and queer daggers held up the curtains. The oysters were served on their arrival and the megaphones stood like extinguishers over each with the name cards tied to the small end. The effect was really unique. Aunt Mary had one, too, and they were all rejoiced at her delight in the scheme, and a few seconds after they were doubly rejoiced over its success for no one had to speak loud—the megaphones did it all, producing a lovely clamor which deafened all those who could hear and caused Aunt Mary to feel that she heard with the rest.

Amidst the cheerful din they exchanged such very wild remarks as oysters always inspire and each and all were mutually content at the effect thereof. Then they finished, and Burnett rose at once, flung back the portières, and led them in upon their soup which stood smoking on a large card table in the next room. There were boutonnières with the soup, and violets for Aunt Mary, and again they used the megaphones and again the conversation partook of the customary conversation which soup produces.

The soup finished, Burnett jumped up again and threw back other portières and they all moved out into a dining-room, with its table spread with a substantial dinner. This time it was the real thing. Candelabra, ice-pails, etc.

Aunt Mary had a parrot in a gilt tower, and all the men had white mice in houses shaped like hat-boxes. Mitchell’s seat was flanked with wine coolers, and Burnett’s, too. There was all that they could desire to eat and drink and more. The feast began, and it was grand and glorious.

“I’ll tell you what,” said Aunt Mary, in the midst of the revel, “if this is what it means in papers when it speaks of high livin’, I don’t blame ’em for bein’ willin’ to die of it young. One week like this is worth ten years with Lucinda. Twenty. A whole life.”

“Say, Jack,” said Burnett in an undertone, “let’s have Lucinda come to town next and see the effect on her.”

“Miss Watkins,” said Clover through his megaphone, “as a mark of my affection I beg to offer you my white mouse. Do you accept?”

“Oh, I don’t want to go back to the house yet,” said Aunt Mary, much disturbed. “It’s too soon.”

“We won’t go home till morning,” said Burnett. “Not by a long shot. Here, Mitchell, give us a speech. Home! we don’t want to _drink_ to it, but we do want to drink to it _here_.”

“Home!” said Mitchell, rising with his glass in his hand. “Home! here’s to home, and I’ll drink to it in anything but a cab. Home, Aunt Mary and gentlemen, is the place where one may go when every other place is closed. As long as any other place is open, however, I do not recommend going home. The contrast is always sharp and bitter and to be avoided until unavoidable circumstances, over which we possess but little control, force us to give our address to the man who drives and let him drive us to the last place on the map. And so I drink to that last place—home; and here’s to it, not now, but a good deal later, and not then unless what must be has got to result.”

Mitchell paused and they all drank.

“Me next now,” exclaimed Burnett, jumping to his feet. “I’m going to make a speech at my own dinner, and as a good speech is best made off-hand, I’ve picked out an off-hand subject and arise to give you ‘Lucinda.’ Having never met her I feel able to say nothing good about her and I call the company present to witness that I shall say nothing bad either. I gather from what I have had a stray chance of picking up that Lucinda is all that she should be, and nothing frisqué. The latter quality is too bad, but it’s not my fault. Therefore, I say again ‘Lucinda’, and here’s to her very good health. May she never regret that Fate has given her no chance to have anything to regret.”

Aunt Mary applauded this speech heartily even if she hadn’t quite caught the whole of it and had no idea of whom it was about.

“Who’s goin’ to speak now?” she asked anxiously.

“I am,” said Clover modestly. “I rise to propose the health of our honored guest, Miss Watkins. We all know what kin she is to one of us, and we all weep that she didn’t do as well by the rest of us. Aunt Mary! Glasses down!”

“You can’t drink this, you know, Aunt Mary,” said Jack,—“it’s bad taste to drink to yourself.”

“I don’t want to drink,” said Aunt Mary, beaming,—“I like to watch you.”

“Here’s to Aunt Mary’s liking to watch us!” cried Clover.

“No,” said Burnett rising, “don’t. It’s time to go and get the salad now.”

“We’d ought to have the automobile for this party,” said Aunt Mary, and everyone applauded her idea, as they rose and gathered up their belongings.

It was a droll procession of men with mice and a lady with a parrot that got under way and moved in among the Japanese fans and swinging lanterns of the next room in the suite of Burnett’s friend. Five little individual tables were laid there and on each table lay a Japanese creature of some sort which—being opened somewhere—revealed salad within.

“Well, I never did!” exclaimed the guest; “this dinner ought to be put in a book!”

“We’ll put it in ourselves first,” said Mitchell. “I never believe in booking any attraction until it has been tried on a select few. Burnett having selected me for one of this few, I vote we begin on the salad.”

They began forthwith.

Aunt Mary suddenly stopped eating.

“Some one called,” she said.

“It’s the parrot,” said Jack; “I heard him before.”

“What does he say?” said Mitchell.

“Listen and you’ll find out,” said Jack.

They all listened and presently the parrot said solemnly:

“Now see what you’ve done!” and relapsed into silence.

“What does he mean?” Aunt Mary asked.

“He’s referring to his own affairs,” said Burnett; “come on—let’s get coffee now!”

They all adjourned to a tiny room lined with posters and decorated with pipe racks, and there had ice cream in the form of bulls and bears, and coffee of the strongest variety. And then cordials and cigarettes.

“Now, where shall we go to first?” asked Burnett when all were well lit up. No one would have guessed that he had ever felt used up in all his life before.

“To a roof garden,” said Mitchell. “We’ll go to a roof garden first, and then we’ll go to more roof gardens, and after that if the spirit moves we’ll go to yet a few roof gardens in addition. We’ll show our dear aunt what wonders can be done with roofs, and to-morrow she’ll wonder what was done with her.”

“That’s the bill,” said Clover, “and let’s go now. I can see from the general manner of my mouse that he’s dying to get out and make his way in the wide world.”

“Mine the same,” said Mitchell; “by George, it worries me to see such restless, feverish manners in what I had supposed would be a quiet domestic companion. It presages a distracted existence. But come on.”

They all rose.

“Where are we goin’ now?” asked Aunt Mary.

“To a roof garden,” said Jack, “and we’re going to take the whole menagerie, Aunt Mary. We’re going to get put in the papers. That’s the great stunt,—to get put in the papers.”

“But we’ll leave the megaphones,” said Mitchell. “I won’t go about with a mouse and a megaphone. People might think I looked silly. People are so queer.”

“Put the mouse in the megaphone,” suggested Burnett. “That’s the way my mother taught me to pack when I was a kid. You put your tooth brush in a shoe, and the shoe in a sleeve and then turn the sleeve inside out. Oh, I tell you—what is home without a mother?—Put the mouse in the megaphone and stop up both ends. What are your hands and your mouth for?”

“Yes,” said Mitchell, “I think I see myself so handling a megaphone that the mouse doesn’t run out either end or into my mouth. My mouth is a good mouth and it’s served me well and I won’t turn it over to a mouse at this late day.”

“Let’s keep the mice in their cages,” said Clover, and as he spoke he dropped his.

“Now see what you’ve done!” said the parrot.

“I didn’t hurt it,” said Clover. “Come on now.”

“Yes, come on,” said Burnett. “It’s long after ten o’clock. You want to remember that even roof gardens are not eternally on tap.”

“Well, I’m trying to hurry all I can,” said Mitchell. “I’m the picture of patience scurrying for dear life only unable to lay hands on her gloves.”

“I don’t catch what’s the trouble,” said Aunt Mary to Jack.

“Nothing’s the trouble,” said Jack, “everything’s fine and dandy. We’re going out now. Time of your life, Aunt Mary, time of your life!”

They telephoned for a carriage and all got in. Then Clover slammed the door.

“Now see what you’ve done!” said the parrot.

“Is he going to keep saying that?” Burnett asked.

“I don’t know,” said Jack. “It comes in pretty pat, don’t it?”

“Makes me think of my mother,” said Clover. “I wish it wouldn’t.”

“I don’t catch who’s sayin’ what,” said Aunt Mary.

“Nobody’s saying anything, Miss Watkins,” roared Mitchell; “we are all talking airy nothings just to pass the time o’ day.”

The carriage stopped three hundred feet below the level of a roof garden.

“We get out here,” said Burnett.

They all got out and went up in an elevator.

“Seems to be a good many goin’ to the same place,” said Aunt Mary.

“Yes,” said Mitchell, “a good many people generally go to places that are great places for a good many people to go to.”

“You ought not to end with a preposition,” said Clover.

“There, I left my ear-trumpet in the carriage!” said Aunt Mary.

There was a pause of consternation. No one spoke except the parrot.

“We know what she’s done without your telling us,” said Clover, addressing the bird. “The question is what to do next?”

Jack went back downstairs and found the carriage waiting in hopes of picking up another load. He lost no time in personally picking up the ear-trumpet and returning to his friends.

Then they all proceeded above and bought a table and turned their chairs to the stage, where the attraction just at that moment was a quartette of pretty girls.

“I’ll tell you what we’ll do,” said Burnett the instant the girls began to sing. “Let’s each tie a card to a mouse and present them to the girls!”

The suggestion found favor and was followed out to the letter. But when the girls were through and the Chinaman who followed them on the programme was also over, the pleasures of life in that spot palled upon the party.

“Oh, come,” said Burnett, “let’s go somewhere else. Let’s go out in the air.”

His suggestion found favor. And they sallied forth and visited another roof garden, a theater where they saw the last quarter of the fourth act, a place where Aunt Mary was given a gondola ride, and a place where she was given something in the shape of light refreshments.

Then, becoming thirsty, they ordered a few White Horses and Red Horses and the Necks of yet other horses, but Aunt Mary declined the horses of all colors and Mitchell upheld her.

“That’s right,” he said, “I’m a great believer in knowing when you’ve had enough, and I’m sure you’ve all had so much too much that I know that I must have had enough and that she’s better off with none at all.”

“I reckon you’re right,” said Clover. “I’ve had enough, surely. I can’t see over my pile of little saucers, and when I can’t see over my pile of little saucers I’m always positive that I’ve had enough.”

Jack laughed and then ceased laughing and drew down the corners of his mouth.

“Why do people sit on chairs?” Clover asked just then. “Why don’t everyone sit on the floor? You never feel as if you might slip off the floor.”

“Ah,” said Mitchell, “if we were not always trying to rise above Nature we should all be sitting where Nature intended,—when we weren’t swinging by our tails and picking cocoanuts.”

“Come on and let’s go somewhere else,” said Burnett. “Every time I look at somebody it’s someone else and that makes me nervous.”

“Now see what you’ve done!” said the parrot.

“Did you know his long suit when you bought him?” Clover asked Burnett.

“No,” said Burnett; “they told me that he didn’t use slang and that was all.”

It was well along in the evening—or night—and a brisk discussion arose as to where to go next.

“I’ll tell you,” said Clover, “we’ll take a ride. Let me see what time is it?—12.30. Just the time for a drive. We’ll take three cabs and sally forth and drive up and down and back and forth in the cool night air.”

“And jews-harps!” cried Burnett. “Oh, I say, there’s a bully idea! We’ll go to a drug store and buy some jews-harps and play on them as we drive along. We’ll each sing our own tune, and the effect will be so novel. Let’s do it.”

“Jews-harps—” said Clover thoughtfully, “jews-harps for three cabs—that’ll make—let me see—that’ll make—” he hesitated.

“Oh, the driver will make the change,” said Burnett impatiently. “Come on. If we’re going to have the cabs and jews-harps it’s time to get out and take the stump in the good cause.”

“Where’s my ear-trumpet?” said Aunt Mary, blankly,—“it’s been left somewhere.”

“No, it hasn’t,” said Mitchell. “It’s here! I’m holding it for you. It’s much easier holding it than picking it up. It seems so slippery to-night.”