The Portygee Part 56

Others came to shake hands and voice a welcome. The formal reception, that with the band, had been called off at Captain Zelotes's request, but the informal one was, in spite of the rain, which was now much less heavy, quite a sizable gathering.

The Reverend Mr. Kendall held his hand for a long time and talked much, it seemed to Albert that he had aged greatly since they last met. He wandered a bit in his remarks and repeated himself several times.

"The poor old gentleman's failin' a good deal, Albert," said Mrs. Snow, as they drove home together, he and his grandparents, three on the seat of the buggy behind Jessamine. "His sermons are pretty tiresome nowadays, but we put up with 'em because he's been with us so long... .

Ain't you squeezed 'most to death, Albert? You two big men and me all mashed together on this narrow seat. It's lucky I'm small. Zelotes ought to get a two-seated carriage, but he won't."

"Next thing I get, Mother," observed the captain, "will be an automobile. I'll stick to the old mare here as long as she's able to navigate, but when she has to be hauled out of commission I'm goin'

to buy a car. I believe I'm pretty nigh the last man in this county to drive a horse, as 'tis. Makes me feel like what Sol Dadgett calls a cracked teapot--a 'genuine antique.' One of these city women will be collectin' me some of these days. Better look out, mother."

Olive sighed happily. "It does me good to hear you joke again, Zelotes," she said. "He didn't joke much, Albert, while--when we thought you--you--"

Albert interrupted in time to prevent the threatened shower.

"So Mr. Kendall is not well," he said. "I'm very sorry to hear it."

"Of course you would be. You and he used to be so friendly when Helen was home. Oh, speakin' of Helen, she IS comin' home in a fortni't or three weeks, so I hear. She's goin' to give up her teachin' and come back to be company for her father. I suppose she realizes he needs her, but it must be a big sacrifice for her, givin' up the good position she's got now. She's such a smart girl and such a nice one. Why, she came to see us after the news came--the bad news--and she was so kind and so good. I don't know what we should have done without her. Zelotes says so too, don't you, Zelotes?"

Her husband did not answer. Instead he said: "Well, there's home, Al.

Rachel's there ahead of us and dinner's on the way, judgin' by the smoke from the kitchen chimney. How does the old place look to you, boy?"

Albert merely shook his head and drew a long breath, but his grandparents seemed to be quite satisfied.

There were letters and telegrams awaiting him on the table in the sitting-room. Two of the letters were postmarked from a town on the Florida coast. The telegram also was from that same town.

"_I_ had one of those things," observed Captain Zelotes, alluding to the telegram. "Fosd.i.c.k sent me one of those long ones, night-letters I believe they call 'em. He wants me to tell you that Mrs. Fosd.i.c.k is better and that they cal'late to be in New York before very long and shall expect you there. Of course you knew that, Al, but I presume likely the main idea of the telegram was to help say, 'Welcome home' to you, that's all."

Albert nodded. Madeline and her mother had been in Florida all winter.

Mrs. Fosd.i.c.k's health was not good. She declared that her nerves had given way under her frightful responsibilities during the war. There was, although it seems almost sacrilege to make such a statement, a certain similarity between Mrs. Fletcher Fosd.i.c.k and Issachar Price. The telegram was, as his grandfather surmised, an expression of welcome and of regret that the senders could not be there to share in the reception.

The two letters which accompanied it he put in his pocket to read later on, when alone. Somehow he felt that the first hours in the old house belonged exclusively to his grandparents. Everything else, even Madeline's letters, must take second place for that period.

Dinner was, to say the least, an ample meal. Rachel and Olive had, as Captain Lote said, "laid themselves out" on that dinner. It began well and continued well and ended best of all, for the dessert was one of which Albert was especially fond. They kept pressing him to eat until Laban, who was an invited guest, was moved to comment.

"Humph!" observed Mr. Keeler. "I knew 'twas the reg'lar program to kill the fatted calf when the prodigal got home, but I see now it's the proper caper to fat up the prodigal to take the critter's place. No, no, Rachel, I'd like fust-rate to eat another bushel or so to please you, but somethin'--that still, small voice we're always readin' about, or somethin'--seems to tell me 'twouldn't be good jedgment... . Um-hm.

... 'Twouldn't be good jedgment... . Cal'late it's right, too... .

Yes, yes, yes."

"Now, Cap'n Lote," he added, as they rose from the table, "you stay right to home here for the rest of the day. I'll hustle back to the office and see if Issy's importance has bust his b'iler for him.

So-long, Al. See you pretty soon. Got some things to talk about, you and I have... . Yes, yes."

Later, when Rachel was in the kitchen with the dishes, Olive left the sitting room and reappeared with triumph written large upon her face. In one hand she held a mysterious envelope and in the other a book. Albert recognized that book. It was his own, The Lances of Dawn. It was no novelty to him. When first the outside world and he had reopened communication, copies of that book had been sent him. His publisher had sent them, Madeline had sent them, his grandparents had sent them, comrades had sent them, nurses and doctors and newspaper men had brought them. No, The Lances of Dawn was not a novelty to its author. But he wondered what was in the envelope.

Mrs. Snow enlightened him. "You sit right down now, Albert," she said.

"Sit right down and listen because I've got somethin' to tell you. Yes, and somethin' to show you, too. Here! Stop now, Zelotes! You can't run away. You've got to sit down and look on and listen, too."

Captain Zelotes smiled resignedly. There was, or so it seemed to his grandson, an odd expression on his face. He looked pleased, but not altogether pleased. However, he obeyed his wife's orders and sat.

"Stop, look and listen," he observed. "Mother, you sound like a railroad crossin'. All right, here I am. Al, the society of 'What did I tell you'

is goin' to have a meetin'."

His wife nodded. "Well," she said, triumphantly, "what DID I tell you?

Wasn't I right?"

The captain pulled his beard and nodded.

"Right as right could be, Mother," he admitted. "Your figgers was a few hundred thousand out of the way, maybe, but barrin' that you was perfectly right."

"Well, I'm glad to hear you say so for once in your life. Albert,"

holding up the envelope, "do you know what this is?"

Albert, much puzzled, admitted that he did not. His grandmother put down the book, opened the envelope and took from it a slip of paper.

"And can you guess what THIS is?" she asked. Albert could not guess.

"It's a check, that's what it is. It's the first six months' royalties, that's what they call 'em, on that beautiful book of yours. And how much do you suppose 'tis?"

Albert shook his head. "Twenty-five dollars?" he suggested jokingly.

"Twenty-five dollars! It's over twenty-five HUNDRED dollars. It's twenty-eight hundred and forty-three dollars and sixty-five cents, that's what it is. Think of it! Almost three thousand dollars! And Zelotes prophesied that 'twouldn't be more than--"

Her husband held up his hand. "Sh-s.h.!.+ Sh-sh, Mother," he said. "Don't get started on what I prophesied or we won't be through till doomsday.

I'll give in right off that I'm the worst prophet since the feller that h'isted the 'Fair and Dry' signal the day afore Noah's flood begun. You see," he explained, turning to Albert, "your grandma figgered out that you'd probably clear about half a million on that book of poetry, Al. I cal'lated 'twan't likely to be much more'n a couple of hundred thousand, so--"

"Why, Zelotes Snow! You said--"

"Yes, yes. So I did, Mother, so I did. You was right and I was wrong.

Twenty-eight hundred ain't exactly a million, Al, but it's a darn sight more than I ever cal'lated you'd make from that book. Or 'most anybody else ever made from any book, fur's that goes," he added, with a shake of the head. "I declare, I--I don't understand it yet. And a poetry book, too! Who in time BUYS 'em all? Eh?"

Albert was looking at the check and the royalty statement.

"So this is why I couldn't get any satisfaction from the publisher," he observed. "I wrote him two or three times about my royalties, and he put me off each time. I began to think there weren't any."

Captain Zelotes smiled. "That's your grandma's doin's," he observed.

"The check came to us a good while ago, when we thought you was--was--well, when we thought--"

"Yes. Surely, I understand," put in Albert, to help him out.

"Yes. That's when 'twas. And Mother, she was so proud of it, because you'd earned it, Al, that she kept it and kept it, showin' it to all hands and--and so on. And then when we found out you wasn't--that you'd be home some time or other--why, then she wouldn't let me put it in the bank for you because she wanted to give it to you herself. That's what she said was the reason. I presume likely the real one was that she wanted to flap it in my face every time she crowed over my bad prophesyin', which was about three times a day and four on Sundays."

"Zelotes Snow, the idea!"

"All right, Mother, all right. Anyhow, she got me to write your publisher man and ask him not to give you any satisfaction about those royalties, so's she could be the fust one to paralyze you with 'em.

And," with a frank outburst, "if you ain't paralyzed, Al, I own up that _I_ am. Three thousand poetry profits beats me. _I_ don't understand it."

His wife sniffed. "Of course you don't," she declared. "But Albert does.

And so do I, only I think it ought to have been ever and ever so much more. Don't you, yourself, Albert?"

The author of The Lances of Dawn was still looking at the statement of its earnings.

"Approximately eighteen thousand sold at fifteen cents royalty," he observed. "Humph! Well, I'll be hanged!"