Mrs. Tree Part 4

"Will you show him in here, or shall I come and fetch him?"

"Well! of all the cantankerous--here! come in, you! she wants to see you!" and Direxia, holding the door in her hand, beckoned angrily to some one invisible. There was a murmur, a reluctant shuffle, and a man appeared in the doorway and stood lowering, his eyes fixed on the ground; a tall, slight man, with stooping shoulders, and delicate pointed features. He was shabbily dressed, yet there was something fastidious in his air, and it was noticeable that the threadbare clothes were clean.

Mrs. Tree looked at him; looked again. "What do you want here?" she asked, abruptly.

The man's eyes crept forward to her little feet, resting on the bra.s.s fender, and stopped there.

"I asked for food," he said. "I am hungry."

"Are you a tramp?"

"Yes, madam."

"Anything else?"

The man was silent.

"There!" said Direxia, impatiently. "That'll do. Come out into the kitchen and I'll give ye something in a bag, and you can take it with you."

"I shall be pleased to have you take supper with me, sir!" said the old lady, pointedly addressing the tramp. "Direxia, set a place for this gentleman."

The color rushed over the man's face. He started, and his eyes crept half-way up the old lady's dress, then dropped again.

"I--cannot, madam!" he said, with an effort. "I thank you, but you must excuse me."

"Why can't you?"

This time the eyes travelled as far as the diamond brooch, and rested there curiously.

"You must excuse me!" repeated the man, laboriously. "If your woman will give me a morsel in the kitchen--or--I'd better go at once!" he said, breaking off suddenly. "Good evening!"

"Stop!" said Mrs. Tree, striking her ebony stick sharply on the floor.

There was an instant of dead silence, no one stirring.

"Direxia," she added, presently, "go and set another place for supper!"

Direxia hesitated. The stick struck the floor again, and she vanished, muttering.

"Shut the door!" Mrs. Tree commanded, addressing the stranger. "Come here and sit down! No, not on that cheer. Take the ottoman with the bead puppy on it. There!"

As the man drew forward the ottoman without looking at it, and sat down, she leaned back easily in her chair, and spoke in a half-confidential tone:

"I get crumpled up, sitting here alone. Some day I shall turn to wood. I like a new face and a new notion. I had a grandson who used to live with me, and I'm lonesome since he died. How do you like tramping, now?"

"Pretty well," said the man. He spoke over his shoulder, and kept his face toward the fire; it was a chilly evening. "It's all right in summer, or when a man has his health."

"See things, hey?" said the old lady. "New folks, new faces? Get ideas; is that it?"

The man nodded gloomily.

"That begins it. After awhile--I really think I must go!" he said, breaking off short. "You are very kind, madam, but I prefer to go. I am not fit--"

"Cat's foot!" said Mrs. Tree, and watched him like a cat.

He fell into a fit of helpless laughter, and laughed till the tears ran down his cheeks. He felt for a pocket-handkerchief.

"Here's one!" said Mrs. Tree, and handed him a gossamer square. He took it mechanically. His hand was long and slim--and clean.

"Supper's ready!" snapped Direxia, glowering in at the door.

"I will take your arm, if you please!" said Mrs. Tree to the tramp, and they went in to supper together.

Mrs. Tree's dining-room, like her parlor, was a treasury of rare woods.

The old mahogany, rich with curious bra.s.s-work, shone darkly brilliant against the panels of satin-wood; the floor was a mosaic of bits from Captain Tree's woodpile, as he had been used to call the tumbled heap of precious fragments which grew after every voyage to southern or eastern islands. The room was lighted by candles; Mrs. Tree would have no other light. Kerosene she called nasty, smelly stuff, and gas a stinking smother. She liked strong words, especially when they shocked Miss Phoebe's sense of delicacy. As for electricity, Elmerton knew it not in her day.

The shabby man seemed in a kind of dream. Half unconsciously he put the old lady into her seat and pushed her chair up to the table; then at a sign from her he took the seat opposite. He laid the damask napkin across his knees, and winced at the touch of it, as at the caress of a long-forgotten hand. Mrs. Tree talked on easily, asking questions about the roads he travelled and the people he met. He answered as briefly as might be, and ate sparingly. Still in a dream, he took the cup of tea she handed him, and setting it down, pa.s.sed his finger over the handle.

It was a tiny gold Mandarin, clinging with hands and feet to the side of the cup. The man gave another helpless laugh, and looked about him as if for a door of escape.

Suddenly, close at his elbow, a voice spoke; a harsh, rasping voice, with nothing human in it.

"Old friends!" said the voice.

The man started to his feet, white as the napkin he held.

"_My G.o.d!_" he said, violently.

"It's only the parrot!" said Mrs. Tree, comfortably. "Sit down again.

There he is at your elbow. Jocko is his name. He does my swearing for me. My grandson and a friend of his taught him that, and I have taught him a few other things beside. Good Jocko! speak up, boy!"

"Old friends to talk!" said the parrot. "Old books to read; old wine to drink! Zooks! hooray for Arthur and Will! they're the boys!"

"That was my grandson and his friend," said the old lady, never taking her eyes from the man's face. "What's the matter? feel faint, hey?"

"Yes," said the man. He was leaning on the back of his chair, fighting some spasm of feeling. "I am--faint. I must get out into the air."

The old lady rose briskly and came to his side. "Nothing of the sort!"

she said. "You'll come up-stairs and lie down."

"No! no! no!" cried the man, and with each word his voice rang out louder and sharper as the emotion he was fighting gripped him closer.

"Not in this house. Never! Never!"

"Cat's foot!" said Mrs. Tree. "Don't talk to me! Here! give me your arm!

_Do as I say!_ There!"

"Old friends!" said the parrot.

"I'm going to loose the bulldog, Mis' Tree," said Direxia, from the foot of the stairs; "and Deacon Weight says he'll be over in two minutes."