Anything Once, Isabel Ostrander [classic children's novels .TXT] 📗

“So it was Vera, was it?” Jim smiled. “I heard what she said–I mean, it was repeated to me. You were one of that party?”

“Yes. We were with the Lentilhons in their car, and the funniest thing happened the next day on the way home! Crusty old farmer wouldn’t turn out on the road, and Guy Lentilhon lost control and smashed straight through his wagon!” Jack laughed. “W-what do you think it was loaded with?”

“Eggs!” responded Jim crisply. “I happened to be on it at the time, my boy, and 141your sense of humor–I hope you all got what I did! But I must explain to Aunt Emmy here, or she will think that we are both quite mad!”

“And I must be off to the club,” Jack announced. “I’ll break the news to Billy Hollis that we’ve lost. See you later, and we’ll all settle up. Good evening, Mrs. Abbott.”

When the stout young man had taken his departure, Mrs. Abbott turned to her nephew between laughter and tears.

“James, this is the maddest of all mad things that you have ever done!”

“Jack doesn’t know anything about Lou?” Jim demanded anxiously.

“Certainly not. He has only been here a quarter of an hour, and I kept her out of the way. But, James, you cannot be serious! You cannot mean to marry this nameless waif?”

“Stop right there, Aunt Emmy,” he interrupted her firmly. “I’m going to marry, if she will have me, your ward whom you have legally adopted; I mean, you will have adopted her by the time she has grown up. 142But I don’t intend to be nosed out by any of these debutante-grabbers; I’m going to have everything settled before her studies are finished and you bring her out. I saw her first!”

“H-m. We shall see,” Aunt Emmy remarked dryly, adding: “But that can wait for the moment. What was this ridiculous wager all about, and how did you get into such horrible scrapes?”

“The whole thing came out of an idle discussion Jack Trimble, Billy Hollis and I had at the club one night concerning human nature. It drifted into a debate about charity in general and the kindness shown toward strangers by country folk in particular, with myself in the minority, of course,” Jim explained.

“They each wagered me a thousand against my five hundred that I couldn’t walk from Buffalo to New York in twenty-five days with only five dollars in my pocket to start with, and work my way home without begging nor accepting more than a quarter for each job I managed to secure in any one time.

“The idea was to see how many of these 143hard-boiled up-State farmers we hear so much about would offer you the hospitality reputed to be extended only by the rural population of the South and West, and how many would give a foot-sore and weary traveler a lift upon the way. There were other conditions, too; I was not to use my own surname, not to go a foot out of the State into either Pennsylvania or New Jersey. I was not to beg, borrow, or steal, and for the occasional twenty-five cents I might earn I could only purchase food or actual necessities, not use it for transportation, and I must not beat my way by stealing rides on boats or trains or any other conveyances.”

While Aunt Emmy sat staring at him in speechless amazement, Jim produced his little red note-book and laid it before her.

“There’s the route I chose over the mountains, my expense account for each day, and the names and addresses of the people who helped to prove my contention that, take them by and large, the people of my own State are as big-hearted as any in the Union, and Jack’s money and Billy’s says that they are!

144“I’m going to return some of that kindness, Aunt Emmy. There are two little boys near Riverburgh whose father is dead and who are trying to do the farm work of men. They are going to a good school this winter, and there are a few other people who are going to be surprised! By Jove, I never realized what money was for until now! But best of all, I found Lou!”

“And what makes you so sure that I am going to adopt her and educate her and bring her out?” demanded Aunt Emmy. “My dear boy, when you started on this Canadian fishing trip of yours I knew that something extraordinary would come of it, but I did not anticipate anything so bizarre as this! Why do you think that I will interest myself in this child?”

“Because you won’t be able to help it.” His face had sobered, and there was a note in his voice that his aunt had never heard before. “You won’t be able to help loving her when you find out how courageous she is, and sincere and true! She is the biggest-hearted, most candid, naïve little─”

145“She is quite that!” Aunt Emmy interrupted in her turn, with emphasis. “How I am ever to hide her away until I’ve had her coached not to drop her g’s, and to realize that there is a ‘u’ in the alphabet I don’t know, but I’ll try. James–I think there are distinct possibilities there.”

“I knew it!” Jim cried. “I knew you wouldn’t be able to resist her! For the Lord’s sake, Aunt Emmy, don’t let them spoil her! She’s so sweet and simple-hearted, don’t let them make her cynical and worldly-wise! I’ll promise not to speak to her, not to let her know how I feel until you say that I may.”

“Will you, James?” There was a faint smile about the delicately lined lips. “She is a child in many ways, a blank page for most impressions to be made upon, but in other things she is very much of a woman, and I rather fancy that what you have to tell her will not be so much of a surprise.”

“You old dear!” Jim sprang to his feet and folded his aunt in his embrace which threatened her coiffure. “Where is she?”

“In the library waiting for you, Jamie!”

146She used the old nursery name, and caught his arm. “She is very young, but the heart sometimes breaks easily then. Don’t speak unless you yourself are very sure.”

Jim smiled, and throwing back his head looked straight into the kindly old eyes. Then without a word he turned and disappeared through the door.

“And you’re going to be happy here?” It was some time later when Jim had explained about the wager, and they were sitting together in the window-seat.

“Happy? Why, Jim, I can’t believe I’m awake! I’m going to study an’ work an’ try my best to be like her. Seems to me it’ll take the rest of my life, but she says that in a year or two there won’t anybody hardly tell the difference.”

“And then, Lou, when the time is past? What then?”

“I don’t know.” Her tone was serenely unconcerned.

“That trail we’ve followed together for the 147last week wasn’t so bad, was it?” he asked. “You were happy in spite of the hardships?”

“It was wonderful!” She drew a deep breath. “I–I wish we could start again, Jim, and do it all over again, every step of the way!”

“If you feel like that, dear, perhaps some day when you have finished your studies we will start again on a longer trail.” He took one of the little toil-worn hands in his. “The long, long trail, Lou, only we will be together! When that day comes, will you take the new road with me?”

She bowed her head, and somehow he found it nestling in the hollow of his shoulder, and his arms were about her. After a long minute, she stirred and smiled.

“Well–” she hesitated. “You knew from the very beginning, Jim, that I’d do anything once!”