Those Dale Girls Part 7

Julie picked up the battered box, disclosing the cake within crushed to a pancake. She turned to find Hester's head buried in her arms; the girl was sobbing convulsively.

"Never mind, dear," said Julie, stroking her head sympathetically, "it would be much worse if you were hurt too."

"I am not crying," the younger girl a.s.serted stoutly; "not crying at all." She spoke in short gasps that were strangely like sobs, but Julie ignored them. "I am all out of breath from running, that is all, and I did not fall, you goose! A woman sat on me!" She broke into a peal of hysterical laughter.

It was Julie's turn to be speechless now.

"If she had just sat on _me_ it wouldn't have mattered but she tumbled in the car before I knew it and there is the result!" She waved her hand tragically toward the table and wiped her eyes.

"We'll make another one right away, dear."

"Of course we will," responded Hester, pulling off her hat and coat and flinging them down impatiently; "but it breaks my heart to see such a ruin of all our work not to mention the waste of materials!"

Humpty Dumpty sat on the wall; Humpty Dumpty had a great fall; And all the king's horses and all the king's men-

sang Julie, suggestively, but was not allowed to finish the ditty, for Hester said, with a thump on the table:

"We will put this together again double quick and I will get it to Miss Ware before dark, you see if I don't."

"You had better let me go next time, Hester," said Julie, getting out the cooking utensils, "you will be tired to death."

"No, I won't; I have undertaken to do this thing, and I'll put it through if it takes forever," with which characteristic remark she set to work again.

The second effort in the culinary line was, if possible, more successful than the first and immediately after their simple lunch of bread and milk, Hester set forth again. The storm had ceased, and to the immense delight of Peter Snooks, Hester confided to him that she should walk and a certain good little dog that she knew should go too. Julie laughed at this determination to avoid the car and called her superst.i.tious. She laughed, too, but refused to a.n.a.lyze her sensations.

She found Miss Ware, when she was ushered into her presence, in rather an aggressive mood, which caused the girl to look on with some nervousness as she opened the box and surveyed the loaf critically.

"Umph!" she said, examining it through her lorgnette, "did you do that, or Bridget?"

"We did it, Miss Ware. Bridget knows nothing of fancy cooking."

"And you do, it seems. It was an odd trick for a girl to pick up in Virginia, and an undesirable one."

"We look at things differently, Miss Ware," Hester said, with considerable asperity. "I don't call it undesirable if it proves a way of supporting ourselves. I would not choose it-to cook for a living-but we've no choice in the matter whatever."

"Your father is very much to blame, Hester. He should have looked after your interests better when he saw the crash coming. There was no need that you should be left absolutely penniless."

Hester sprang to her feet and confronted Miss Ware like a young tigress.

"You shall not say such things about Dad. I will not listen-I-"

"Hoighty toighty!" broke in Miss Ware, "what a temper! You will have to curb that, my dear Hester, if you expect to get on in the world-as cooks!"

The girl flushed crimson, and bit her lip in an effort to regain her self-control.

"I-I beg your pardon," she faltered. "I-I never knew I had a temper before. It's-it's one of the new things I am learning." A sudden mist came before her, and drawing near she laid her hand on the older woman with an appealing touch. "Don't say unkind things about Daddy, please, Miss Ware; they are not true, and I-I can't bear it."

"Let's get to business," said Miss Ware, who dreaded a scene above everything. "What do you mean to charge for your cake?"

"Fifty cents." Hester was now quite herself again, and went on rapidly, "I want to ask you if you will speak about our work to your friends. I know it is asking a great deal under the circ.u.mstances, but we are such strangers here in Radnor we really do not know any one to ask such a favor of but you and Dr. Ware."

"At least you have a champion in him."

Hester's eyes shone. "Next to Dad we love him better than any one in the world."

"Then why don't you behave sensibly, and come here and live, and let me take you about in society, as I meant to do this winter? I really looked forward to chaperoning you and Julie-you're very unusual girls. Now give up this nonsense of yours and behave properly."

"Oh, Miss Ware, must we go all over that again? Won't you try to see it our way, as-as your brother does? He never even talked of our coming here to live, he understands so well that we want to be independent. I know we must be a great disappointment to you. Cousin Nancy in Virginia feels just as you do, too. Ever so many persons have offered us a home.

You can't think what beautiful letters we've had from Dad's friends through the west. If it were possible to move him we'd go out there to try our fortune; there are so many splendid out-of-door kinds of work a girl can do in that big country. But Dad can't be moved, and we've got to do the best we can right here in Radnor." She spoke convincingly and with a certain submissiveness that sat oddly on her young shoulders.

Miss Ware, twisting her rings round on her fingers with a contemplative air was wondering where the child got that dignity and poise.

"I've no patience with you whatever," she said finally, after a long pause, in which Hester imagined she had been waging an inward conflict.

"I am wholly out of sympathy with your ideas, but you cannot be allowed to starve to death, and if cooking is the height of your ambition-"

"It isn't the height of our ambition," interrupted Hester, for youth is impatient of being misunderstood; "it is only the thing that is nearest at hand."

"Your education must be sadly deficient," regarding the girl critically.

"I always told Philip the harum-scarum way you were being brought up was perfectly ruinous. If you had gone to school like other girls, you would be qualified for some lady-like position."

This was too much for Hester. "You need not trouble to do anything about the cake, Miss Ware," she said, proudly, "and I shan't come here again to hear my father insulted. And we are not going to starve either," she cried, her girlish wrath rising. "We are going to succeed and be a credit to the best education in the world!"

She threw back her head and gazed straight into the older woman's eyes with a fearless look that was hard to meet. Only the fingers curled tight into the palms of her hands, betrayed the mighty effort she was making to hold herself in check, and this Miss Ware did not see, for Hester's unflinching eyes held her with a strange fascination. In another moment the girl had turned and left the room.

For a while after her departure Miss Ware sat motionless like a person who has received a shock. Presently she began to toy with her lorgnette, dangling it back and forth on its chain with a swinging movement as if keeping time to a rhythmic train of thought. This was not, indeed, the case, and the action arose from nervousness, for the usual calm placidity of her mind was sadly ruffled. She was not in the habit of being contradicted, particularly by what she was pleased to call "a young person"; but she was one of those women who having said their worst, proceed to contradict themselves by an interest in that which they have most condemned, and she was now speculating as to whether it would not be expedient to take Hester's cake to the meeting of her sewing cla.s.s the following day, and possibly get an order or two there for it.

Only a true Radnorite could realize the possibilities that opened up to one who was introduced as a subject of discussion at _the_ Sewing Cla.s.s of Radnor. For in the fas.h.i.+onable and exclusive set in which Miss Ware had her being it was a function of tremendous importance, with sacred rites known only to the initiated. In one another's drawing-rooms, on two mornings of the month, forty chosen spirits met to sew for the poor-that great, clamorous, all-devouring body from which there is no escape. This was ostensibly the purpose; in reality sewing was a minor consideration, albeit much work was accomplished. The chief end of its existence was to discuss, direct and control the movements of that exclusive portion of Radnor society of which it was a part and upon which it sat in fortnightly judgment. Following this arduous but important morning duty came the luncheon, and it was of that Miss Ware was thinking in connection with the cake.

When Hester left Miss Ware she ran down the stairs to the lower hall, where she had left Peter Snooks with strict orders to remain until her return. There she found him waiting to greet her with joyous caperings of delight.

Dr. Ware and a tall, clean-shaven, athletic-looking man came out from the office and encountered her.

"Ah, you, Hester?" said the Doctor. "Wait a moment, my dear. I have a book here that I want you to take round to read to your father."

He vanished, and the stranger glanced at the girl, hesitated, and then stooping patted the dog. "You've a fine fox-terrier," he said in a deep, rich voice, looking up.

"We think so," replied Hester, who couldn't for the life of her conceal her pleasure at hearing Peter Snooks praised.

At that moment the Doctor came out again.

"Why, Landor," he said, "I beg your pardon; I forgot all about you when I saw Hester. That is a way the minx has-of driving everything else out of my head. Hester, my dear, this is Kenneth Landor, just up from Texas to have a look at effete civilization-you have heard me speak of him often-Mr. Landor, Miss Dale."

The young people bowed.

"Don't let him pose as a cowboy or anything interesting like that,"

continued the Doctor, "for he isn't really-he only plays at things.

Takes a peep here and there over the continent, and pretends he is this and that and the other, as the mood seizes him. A rolling stone, eh, Landor?" turning with an affectionate, quizzical look at the man beside him.

"Oh! go on, Doctor; pile it on-don't leave me a shred of character. His veracity is absolutely unquestioned, of course, Miss Dale?"