"My Cousin Seth calls himself a blacksmith, but he seems to be a carpenter as well. See? He is actually climbing the roof, to make sure every old, worn-out shingle is replaced by a new one. Trust me, if Seth undertakes anything it will be well done. Your roof will never leak again, as Dorothy said it did that stormy night," said Mrs. Cecil to Martha, while that astonished matron sat now beside her guest, watching and wondering, unable to talk; till at last a sudden fear arose in her housewifely breast, and she answered by asking:

"What shall I do with them? How feed them all? I can just remember such a time when my grandfather had a lot of people come to help, and all the women in the house had to cook for days beforehand, it seems to me, for the one dinner."

"O mother! We can't! Why, there aren't potatoes enough in the pantry for our own dinner, let alone so many people!" cried Dorothy, regretfully regarding her small fingers, roughened now by that cutting of "seed."

"Even if we'd saved all you got of Mrs. Smith they wouldn't have begun to go around. I might--do you suppose I could make biscuit enough, like you taught me for father's supper--if there was flour--and maybe b.u.t.ter, and there was time!"

Mrs. Cecil laughed and drew the girl close to her for a moment; then, rising, said:

"Don't worry, Mrs. Chester, nor Dolly dear. These folks haven't come to make trouble but to save it. I see that the women are gathering in that far field that has already been mowed and raked. Herbert Montaigne is there, with his horse-rake, and I'm curious to see if he can manage something useful as easily as he does his own fast horse. Besides, country women are a bit shy, sometimes, and I want you to go among them with me and get acquainted. Get your--Mrs. Chester a hat, my darling, and your own if you need it, Dorothy."

She spoke with a tone of authority, habitual enough, but she had hesitated for an instant over the word "mother," and Martha's tender, jealous heart was quick to notice it and to a.s.sure herself that "she has taken a notion to my girl and wants to adopt her from me. I know it. I'm as sure as if she'd said so outright. But she shan't. She shall not.

Dorothy is not the kind of child to be handed from pillar to post, that fashion. She's mine. She was sent to me and I shall keep her, even if John did once say that a richer woman could do more for her than we can.

I--I begin almost to--to hate Mrs. Cecil! And I'm glad I didn't borrow money of her instead of that nice old Friend."

By which reflections it seemed that poor, jealous mother Martha likened herself to a "pillar" and the mistress of Deerhurst to a "post." It was in that mood she followed the old lady down to that far field in which the group of women, aided by a few lads, seemed so strangely busy.

Busy, indeed! In a community accustomed to "picnics" conveniences for such were a matter of course; so in some of the wagons had been brought wooden tressels, and the long boards that were laid upon these made the necessary tables for the great feast to come.

In one corner of this field, fragrant now with the freshly cut gra.s.s which Herbert had raked into windrows, was a cl.u.s.ter of trees, giving a comfortable shade; and beneath these the helpful lads detailed for the task set up the tressels and placed the boards in readiness; then brought from the wagons in the road outside such big baskets and so many, all so heavily laden with the best their owners could provide, that Dorothy could only clasp her hands and cry out in amazement:

"Why, this is far and away beyond anything we ever had at home! Even the Sunday-school excursions down the Bay didn't have so many baskets! I wish--how I wish that father was here!"

"Here he shall be!" cried Herbert, jumping from his seat upon the rake and hurrying toward her. "I've gathered up all that's in this lot and I'll go fetch him. Goodness! If there isn't the little mother herself!

Come to see if her precious son has overheated himself by doing something useful! Wait, Dorothy! Here's a lark! My mother wouldn't mix with 'common folks'--I mean she wouldn't be let by Helena--but now she shall. She has let her curiosity and her anxiety over her son and heir"--here the lad swept Dolly a profound bow which she as merrily returned by as profound a courtesy, each laughing as if no disagreement had marked their last interview--"she has come to the 'Bee' and she shall taste of its honey!"

Away he sped, scattering jests and laughter as he went, the farm-wives whom his friendliness had already propitiated looking after him with ready approval, while more than one remarked on the absence of that "insolence" which had been attributed to him.

"The father and daughter may be terrible top-lofty, but there ain't no nonsense in the boy, and the mother looks as if she'd like to be neighborly, if she dared to," said Mrs. Smith, advancing to meet Mrs.

Calvert and Martha. "How-do, Mis' Cecil? It's the crownin' top-notch of the whole business, havin' you come, too. But I knowed you would. I said to John, says I, 'Mis' Calvert's sure to be on hand if she can shake a leg, she ain't one to miss no doin's, she ain't,' I says, and I'm tickled to death to see you can, ma'am."

With this conclusion Mrs. Smith turned a triumphant eye upon her neighbors as if to show them how exceedingly familiar and intimate she was with the greatest lady "up-mounting." Besides, as wife of the commander of this expedition, she realized her own important position: and set to work at once to introduce everybody to Mrs. Chester, for Mrs.

Calvert was already known to most and waited no introduction to those she did not know.

"Now, boys, get them benches sot up right to once! wouldn't keep visitin' ladies standing, would you?" ordered this mistress of ceremonies, herself setting the example by placing a bench under the very shadiest tree and beside the head table. "Now, Mis' Calvert, Mis'

Chester, Dolly, and you, old Mis' Turnbull, step right up and se' down.

Comfortable, be ye? All right, then, we'll have dinner ready in the jerk of a lamb's tail! Mis' Spencer, you set that cherry pie o' yourn on this particular spot an' figure of this table-cloth! I want Mis' Calvert to taste it, an' when she does she'll say she never knew before what cherry pie could be! Fact. Oh! you needn't wriggle an' try to make believe you don't know it yourself, Sarah Spencer, so bein's you've took first prize for pies at the county fair, three-four years hand-runnin'. Fit to set off this very best table-cloth in the bunch--My! but it's fine! yet the lucky woman 'at owns it didn't think the best none too good for this here joyful occasion. I tell you, isn't it a good thing the Lord sent us such a splendid day? Hot? Well, maybe, but need hot weather to make the corn grow an' hay cure right. Now, if that don't beat the Dutch!

here comes the boss himself! Bore right along like a king on his throne!

Hurray!"

By the "boss," of course, it was Mr. Chester she meant: smiling as even that sunny-tempered gentleman had rarely smiled, and carried in a stout chair upon the shoulders of two strong men, while waving them to the tune of his merry whistle, followed Herbert with the crutches.

"Coffee? Smell it! Fried chicken? Well, that's a smart trick. Wait till I copy that over at the camp!" cried the lad, always a hungry chap but never quite so hungry as now; and watching with admiration how deftly two women were deep-frying in a kettle, suspended by three crotched sticks above a fire on the ground, the already prepared fowls which had once been the choicest of their flocks.

Plenty of other things there were, roasts and broils and brews, but Mrs.

Smith's mandate had long before gone forth that: "Our men must have something hot with their dinner, and not all 'cold victuals.' John he can get more work out of a hired man 'an anybody else I ever saw, an' he does it by feedin' 'em. He says, says he, in hayin' time when he wants folks to swing their scythes lively: 'b.u.t.termilk an' whey, Draggin' all the day; Ham an' eggs--Look out for your legs!' So I'm bound to have that tried to Mr. Chester's 'Bee.'"

So not only figuratively but practically it was a case of "ham and eggs," and brimful of his enjoyment, master Herbert now deposited the crutches within easy reach of their owner and hurried to the road, where his mother and sister sat amusedly watching in their phaeton. He made one attempt to vault over the intervening wall, but it was so wide he failed and struck the top in an ignominous heap, which set all the other lads in the field into uproarious laughter--himself joining in it with perfect good humor. Even his mother, whose idol he was, looked at him in surprise, antic.i.p.ating scowls instead of smiles; but the love and sympathy which had emanated from Seth Winters's big heart had touched, that day, the more selfish heart of many another--even the "spoiled"

lad, Herbert's. Ah! the bliss of bestowing kindness! how it returns in an overflow of happiness!

"O son! Are you hurt?" cried Mrs. Montaigne, in alarm. How could anybody fall upon stones in that way and not be injured? But "son" had rebounded from the impact like a rubber ball, or the best trained gymnast of his school, as he was.

Another leap brought him to the side of the carriage and to insisting that his women should return with him to what he called "the festal board," adding "it's literally such, though don't they look dainty?

those rough planks covered with white linen? Oh! but they've got the 'fixings' to make your mouth water. Please get out, mother, Helena, and come. I'll help you over the wall. It's easy. Come!"

But Helena drew up with haughtiness, demanding:

"What can you be thinking of, Herbert Montaigne? The idea of mother or I mixing in such a crowd. If it suits you to play the fool----"

"No foolishness about what I did, I tell you! Why, child alive, I raked the hay together on three whole six-acre fields! I! your good-for-something brother! Think of that, then put it in your pipe and smoke it!"

With that he began strutting up and down beside the phaeton with such a comical resemblance to a pouter pigeon that coachman James had to turn his face aside, lest he should disgrace himself by a smile, while Mrs.

Montaigne laughed aloud.

"Herbert, you dreadful boy! You use more shocking language every day.

There's no need for you to suffer any further contamination by mingling with such persons as are yonder. Don't go back. Ride home with us, and let's go into Newburgh and pay visits upon somebody worth while," coaxed Helena, whose mission in life seemed to be the reconstruction of all with whom she came in contact.

"Not much I go! I hate visits, and if you think you're going to drag me away from Skyrie just the minute the real fun begins, you're mistaken, that's all. Besides, what would my friend Mrs. Calvert think if I deserted her in this base fashion? Why, we've settled it that I'm to be her attendant at this famous dinner--I tell you it's going to make history, this busy b.u.mble 'Bee'! It will be told of and held up as an example of what can be done and should be done, sometimes. No, indeed, I shan't miss it, and you won't unless you're a bigger--I mean more unwise than I think you. Mother's coming anyway, to sit next to Mrs. Calvert and that pretty Dorothy. Huh! Talk about girls! She's a daisy, she is!

Good deal more of one than that little-boy-calf of hers she's so fond of. That's right, mother! Have a will of your own or a will of mine, once in a lifetime!" commended this persuasive son.

Mrs. Montaigne loved both her children, said that she did so equally, and they both ruled her; Helena by fear, Herbert by love. Under all his rollicking nonsense the deepest feeling of the lad's heart was love for the timid little woman who was so ready to sacrifice herself to them all, and who he believed was also the superior of all. Once in a long while she acted with decision. She did so now. Whether the name of Calvert had been one to conjure with, or because she was really anxious to see what sort of people these were who had so evidently "bewitched"

her son, she descended from the phaeton, laughingly demanding if Herbert thought she "possibly could get over that dreadful wall, or should they go further and through the gate?"

"Over it? Easy as breathing!"

She was a tiny woman and he a very strong lad: and before she knew what he was about he had caught her over his back, sack-fashion, and leaped to the top of the wide wall. A couple of steps, and he had swung her down upon the gra.s.s within the field, where she stood too amazed to speak: though Mrs. Smith, observant from a distance, dramatically exclaimed:

"My soul and body! You could knock me down with a feather!"

CHAPTER XIV

AN ASTONISHING QUESTION

"Everybody's here, with all his first wife and children!" cried somebody, facetiously, as the tin horn was blown to summon the men from their labors in the field to their dinner.

"So they be! So they be! yonder comes Mis' Babc.o.c.k with all her flock, root and branch. Reckoned she'd strike Skyrie about feedin' time; but there's plenty, plenty for everyone; and she's a nice woman, a hard worker an' kind neighbor. Sho! Look at Seth Winters! If that man ain't a kind of a mesmeriser, or somethin' like it! for he's actually coaxed that proud Miss Montaigne to join the merry throng! Fact. I just seen him escortin' her through the gate, an', Dorothy! mind you put on your best manners an' treat her real polite, like city folks is supposed to know how. Since she's put her pride in her pocket an' come, I'd like to have her see she ain't the only young lady up-mounting. 'Cause you belong now, you know; you're one of _us_. Go meet her, whilst I fix another chair right alongside her ma and Mis' Calvert!" directed Mrs.

Smith, handing the girl a plate of rusk, with the added injunction: "Take special care o' them biscuit, too, child. I made them myself, I did, an' I want the 'ristocratics to have first chance at 'em. If some them men folks tackle them on the road to table, there won't be nothin'

left of them but the plate. Take care! I--Why, I don't believe she heard a word I said!"

Dorothy had heard in part. She obediently carried the plate to the table, though not to that part of it which its owner had designated, and she had answered: "Yes, Mrs. Smith, I will try." But she had suddenly perceived a forlorn figure, leaning against the stone wall that separated the field from the road, and her interest centered on that.

Poor Peter Piper was peering wistfully into that busy, happy, laughing a.s.semblage of people, as if he longed to be among them yet felt himself shut out. He had not heard about the "Bee," and even if he had might not have comprehended what it meant. Had he been at the blacksmith's home once after the scheme was started, Seth would a.s.suredly have given the half-wit as courteous a chance to share in the fun and labor of that day as he had given all his other neighbors. But Peter had not been seen by anybody who knew him since that visit of his to Skyrie, in company with old Brindle. He had departed then, frowning and greatly troubled.

Why, his clouded mind could not understand; but something had gone wrong. The once deserted farm had become the home of strangers and he could visit it no more. Thus much he felt and knew; and that night he disappeared.

However, the poor fellow's absences were so frequent that n.o.body missed him from the neighborhood and Dorothy had utterly forgotten him. Now, as she saw him, her heart throbbed with pity.