The Corner House Girls Part 19

"And you lived right here with him all those years?"

"Why, Missie, I tell yo' how it was," said Uncle Rufus, dropping his voice. "Yo' see, latterly, Mars' Peter got pecool'ar-ya-as'm. Yo'

might call it pecool'ar. I knowed he was superst.i.tious of folks-ya-as'm. He used ter send me out on errands-plumb foolish errands, Missie; den I reckon he hid t'ings away. But I don' know whar."

"You haven't the least suspicion?" asked Ruth, anxiously.

"Well now!" said Uncle Rufus, rubbing the bald spot on his head as though to stir his wits into action. "Dar was dat time he got mad at me."

"What about?"

"I warn't gone so long on an errand, lak' he 'spected me ter be, I reckon. An' w'en I come back he warn't in his room, an' dere he was a-comin' down from de garret with a lighted candle."

"From the garret?"

"Yes, Missie. An' he sho' was mad with ol' Unc' Rufus."

"Perhaps he hid papers, then, in one of those chests, or bureaus up there?"

"Cyan't say, Missie. Mebbe. But yo' don' ketch Unc' Rufus goin' up dem garret stairs much-no'm!"

"Why not, Uncle Rufus?" asked Ruth, quickly. "Are you afraid of the garret ghost?"

"Glo-ree! who done tell yo' erbout _dat_?" demanded the colored man, rolling his eyes again. "Don' talk erbout ghos'es; it's sho' baid luck."

That was all Ruth could get out of the old negro. He had all the fear of his race for supernatural things.

It was the next day that Mrs. Kranz came to call. The Corner House girls had never seen Mrs. Kranz before, but they never could forget her after their first view of her!

She was a huge lady, in a purple dress, and with a sweeping gray plume on her big hat, and lavender gloves. She had the misfortune to possess a hair-mole on one of her cheeks, and Dot could not keep her eyes off of that blemish, although she knew it was impolite to stare.

Mrs. Kranz came to the front door of the old Corner House and gave a resounding summons on the big, bra.s.s knocker that decorated the middle panel. n.o.body had ventured to approach that door, save Mr. Howbridge, since the Corner House girls had come to Milton.

"Goodness! who can that be?" demanded Agnes, when the reverberations of the knocker echoed through the big hall.

"Company! I know it's company!" cried Tess, running to peer out of the dining-room window.

Ruth gave a glance about the big room, which they still made their sitting room in general, and approached the hall. Dot whispered:

"Oh-ee! I hope there are some little girls coming to call."

There was n.o.body but this huge lady, though half a dozen little girls might have hidden behind her voluminous skirts. Ruth smiled upon the giantess and said, quickly, "Good-morning!"

"Vell!" was the deep-throated reply-almost a grunt. "Vell! iss de family home?"

"Certainly," said Ruth, in her politest way. "Do come in. We are all at home," and she ushered the visitor into the dining-room.

The lady stared hard at all the girls, and then around at the old-fas.h.i.+oned furniture; at the plate rail of Delft china which Ruth had taken out of a cupboard, where it had been hidden away for years; at the ancient cellarette; and at the few pieces of heavy plate with which the highboy and the lowboy were both decorated.

"Vell!" exclaimed the visitor, in that exceedingly heavy voice of hers, and for the third time. "I hear dere iss only madchens-girls-in dis house. Iss dot so-heh?"

"We are the four Kenway girls," said Ruth, pleasantly. "We have no mother or father. But Aunt Sarah--"

"But you own dis house undt all de odder houses vot belonged to dot cr-r-ra-zy old mans-heh?"

Ruth flushed a little. She had begun to feel that such references to Uncle Peter were both unkind and insulting. "Uncle Peter left his property by will to us," she said.

"Vell, I am Mrs. Kranz," said the large lady, her little eyes sparkling in rather a strange way, Ruth thought.

"We are very glad to meet you-to have you call, Mrs. Kranz," Ruth said. "Not many of our neighbors have been in to see us as yet."

"I aind't von of de neighbors, Miss Kenway," said the visitor. "I am choose Mrs. Kranz. I keeps de grocery store on Meadow Street yet."

"We are just as glad to see you, Mrs. Kranz," returned Ruth, still smiling, "although you do not live very near us," for she knew that Meadow Street was at the other side of the town.

"Vell! maype nodt," said Mrs. Kranz. "Maype you iss nodt so glad to see me yet. I gome to tell you dot I vill nodt stand for dot Joe Maroni no longer. He has got to get dot cellar oudt. His r-r-rotten vegetables smells in mine nostrils. His young vuns iss in my vay-undt dey steal. An' dey are all very, very dirty.

"I keep a nice shop-eferbody vill tell you so, Miss Kenway. Idt iss a clean shop, and them _Eye_-talians dey iss like pigs yet-de vay dey lif!" cried Mrs. Kranz, excitedly. "I pay mine rent, undt I haf mine rights. I gome to tell you-so-o!"

"Oh, dear me!" breathed Ruth, in surprise. "I-I don't know what you are talking about, Mrs. Kranz. Have-have _we_ got anything to do with your trouble?"

"Vell!" exclaimed the large lady. "Hafn't you say you own de house?"

"So Mr. Howbridge says. We own this house--"

"Undt _mine_ house," declared Mrs. Kranz. "Undt more houses. Your uncle, Herr Stower, own idt. I pay mine rent to him for ten year yet."

Ruth began to see-and so did Agnes. Of course, the little girls only stared and wondered at the woman's coa.r.s.e voice and strange appearance.

"You were one of uncle's tenants?" said Ruth, quickly.

"For ten year," repeated Mrs. Kranz.

"And you are having trouble with another tenant?"

"Mit dot Joe Maroni. He has kinder like steps-von, two, tri, fo', five, six-like _dot_," and the woman indicated by gestures the height of the children in rotation. "Dey swarm all ofer de blace. I cannot stand dem-undt de dirt-Ach! idt iss terrible."

"I am sorry, Mrs. Kranz," Ruth said, quietly. "I understand that this Italian family are likewise tenants of the house?"

"They lif de cellar in-undt sell vegetables, undt coal, undt wood, undt ice-undt dirt! heafens, vot dirt!" and the plume on Mrs. Kranz's hat trembled throughout its length, while her red face grew redder, and her eyes more sparkling.

"But perhaps, Mrs. Kranz, the poor things know no better," Ruth suggested. "It must be dreadful to have to live in a cellar. They have n.o.body to teach them. Don't the children go to school-when there is school, I mean?"

"Undt I-am _I_ no example to dem yet?" demanded the lady. "Ach! dese foreigners! I nefer could get along yet mit foreigners."

This tickled Agnes so that she laughed, and then coughed to hide it.

Mrs. Kranz was attracted to the twelve year old.

"Dot iss a pretty madchen," she said, smiling broadly upon Agnes. "She iss your sister, too? Undt de kinder?" her sharp eyes sighting Tess and Dot.