The Wrong Twin Read online

  CHAPTER IV

  In the Penniman home it was not merely Sunday morning; it was Sabbathmorning. Throughout the house a subdued bustling, decorous and solemn; ahushed, religious hurry of preparation for church. In the bathroom JudgePenniman shaved his marbled countenance with tender solicitude, fittinghimself to adorn a sanctuary. In other rooms Mrs. Penniman and Winonaarrayed themselves in choice raiment for behoof of the godly; in eachwere hurried steppings, as from closet to mirror; shrill whisperings ofsilken drapery as it fell into place. In the parlour the Merle twin satreading an instructive book. With unfailing rectitude he had been thefirst to don Sabbath garments, and now lacked merely his shoes, whichwere being burnished by his brother in the more informal atmosphere ofthe woodshed, to which the Sabbath strain of preparation did notpenetrate.

  It was the Wilbur twin's weekly task to do the shoes of himself andbrother and those of the judge. No one could have told precisely why thetask fell to him, and he had never thought to question. The thing simplywas. Probably Winona, asked to wrestle with the problem, would haveurged that Merle was always the first one dressed, and should not beexpected to submit his Sunday suit to the hazards of this toil. Shewould have added, perhaps, that anyway it was more suitable work forWilbur, the latter being of a rougher spiritual texture. Also, Merlecould be trusted to behave himself in the Penniman parlour, not touchingthe many bibelots there displayed, or disarranging the furniture, whilethe Wilbur twin would not only touch and disarrange, but pry into andhandle and climb and altogether demoralize. In all the parlour therewas but one object for which he had a seemly respect--the vast paintingof a recumbent lion behind bars. It was not an ordinary picture, such asmay be seen in galleries, for the bars guarding the fierce beast werereal bars set into the frame, a splendid conceit that the Wilbur twinnever tired of regarding. If you were alone in the sacred room you couldgo right up to the frame and feel the actual bars and put your handthrillingly through them to touch the painted king of the jungle. Butthe Merle twin could sit alone in the presence of this prized arttreasure and never think of touching it. He would sit quietly and readhis instructive book and not occasion the absent Winona any anxiety.Wherefore the Wilbur twin each Sabbath morning in the woodshed polishedthree pairs of shoes, and not uncheerfully. He would, in truth, muchrather be there at his task than compelled to sit in the parlour withhis brother present to tell if he put inquiring fingers into the lion'scage.

  He had finished the shoes of his brother and himself, not taking toomuch pains about the heels, and now laboured at the more considerablefootgear of the judge. The judge's shoes were not only broad, but of asurface abounding in hills and valleys. As Dave Cowan said, the judge'sfeet were lumpy. But the Wilbur twin was conscientious here, and thejudge's heels would be as resplendent as the undulating toes. The taskhad been appreciably delayed by Frank, the dog, who, with a quaintrelish for shoe blacking, had licked a superb polish from one shoe whilethe other was under treatment. His new owner did not rebuke him. Heconceived that Frank had intelligently wished to aid in the work, andapplauded him even while securing the shined shoes from his furtherassistance.

  But one pagan marred this chastened Sabbath harmony of preparation. Inthe little house Dave Cowan lolled lordly in a disordered bed, smokedhis calabash pipe beside a disordered breakfast tray, fetched him by theWilbur twin, and luxuriated in the merely Sunday--and notSabbath--edition of a city paper shrieking with black headlines andspectacular with coloured pictures; a pleasing record of crimes anddisasters and secrets of the boudoir, the festal diversions of theopulent, the minor secrets of astronomy, woman's attire, baseball, highart, and facial creams. As a high priest of the most liberal of allarts, Dave scanned the noisy pages with a cynical and professional eye,knowing that none of the stuff had acquired any dignity or power tocoerce human belief until mere typesetters like himself had crystallizedit. Not for Dave Cowan was the printed word of sacred authority. He hadset up too much copy. But he was pleased, nevertheless, thus to whileand doze away a beautiful Sabbath morning that other people made rathera trial of.

  Having finished the last of the judge's shoes, the Wilbur twin took themand the shoes of Merle to their owners, then hastened with his own tothe little house where he must dress in his own Sunday clothes, wash hishands with due care--they would be doubtingly inspected by Winona--andput soap on his hair to make it lie down. Merle's hair would liepolitely as combed, but his own hair owned no master but soap. Lackingthis, it stood out and up in wicked disorder--like the hair of a rowdy,Winona said.

  The rebellious stuff was at last plastered deceitfully to his skull asif a mere brush had smoothed it, and with a final survey, to assurehimself that he had forgotten none of those niceties of the toilet thatWinona would insist upon, he took his new straw hat and went again tothe Penniman house. For the moment he was in flawless order, as neat, ascompactly and accurately accoutred as the Merle twin, to whom thiseffect came without effort. But it would be so only for a few fleetingmoments. He mournfully knew this, and so did Winona. Within five blocksfrom home and still five blocks from the edifice of worship, while Merleappeared as one born to Sunday clothes and shined shoes and a new hat,the Wilbur twin would be one to whom Sabbath finery was exotic andunwelcome. The flawless lustre of his shoes would be dulled, even thoughhe walked sedately the safe sidewalk; his broad collar and bluepolka-dotted cravat would be awry, one stocking would be down, hisjacket yawning, all his magnificence seeming unconquerably alien. Winonadid him the justice to recognize that this disarray was due to nowilfulness of its victim. He was helpless against a malign current ofhis being.

  He held himself stiff in the parlour until the Pennimans came rustlingdown the stairway. He could exult in a long look at the benignant lionback of real bars, but, of course, he could not now reach up to touchthe bars. It would do something to his clothes, even if the watchful andupright Merle had not been there to report a transgression of the rules.Merle also stood waiting, his hat nicely in one hand.

  The judge descended the stairs, monumental in black frock coat, graytrousers, and the lately polished shoes that were like shining reliefmaps of a hill country. He carried a lustrous silk hat, which he nowpaused to make more lustrous, his fingers clutching a sleeve of his coatand pulling it down to make a brush. The hat was the only item of thejudge's regal attire of which the Wilbur twin was honestly envious--itwas so beautiful, so splendid, so remote. He had never even dared totouch it. He could have been left alone in the room with it, and stillwould have surveyed it in all respect from a proper distance.

  Mrs. Penniman came next, rustling in black silk and under a flowered hatthat Winona secretly felt to be quite too girlish. Then Winona from thedoor of her room above called to the twins, and they ascended thestairway for a last rite before the start for church, the bestowal ofperfume upon each. Winona stood in the door of her room, as each Sundayshe stood at this crisis, the cut-glass perfume bottle in hand. Thetwins solemnly approached her, and upon the white handkerchief of eachshe briefly inverted the bottle. The scent enveloped them delectably asthe handkerchiefs were replaced in the upper left pockets, foldedcorners protruding correctly. As Wilbur turned away Winona swiftlymoistened a finger tip in the precious stuff and drew it across thepale brow of Merle. It was a furtive tribute to his inherent socialsuperiority.

  Winona, in her own silk--not black, but hardly less severe--and in a hatless girlish than her mother's, rustled down the stairs after them.Speech was brief and low-toned among the elders, as befitted the highmoment. The twins were solemnly silent. Amid the funereal gloom, brokenonly by a hushed word or two from Winona or her mother, the judgecompleted his fond stroking of the luminous hat, raised it slowly, andwith both hands adjusted it to his pale curls. Then he took up hisgold-headed ebony cane and stepped from the dusk of the parlour into thelight of day, walking uprightly in the pride of fine raiment andconscious dignity. Mrs. Penniman walked at his side, not unconsciousherself of the impressive mien of her consort.

  Followed Winona and Merle, t
he latter bearing her hymn book and at somepains keeping step with his companion. Behind them trailed the Wilburtwin, resolving, as was his weekly rule, to keep himself neat throughchurch and Sunday-school--yet knowing in his heart it could not be done.Already he could feel his hair stiffening as the coating of soap driedupon it. Pretty soon the shining surface would crack and disorder ensue.What was the use? As he walked carefully now he inhaled rich scent fromthe group--Winona's perfume combining but somehow not blending with apungent, almost vivid, aroma of moth balls from the judge's frock coat.

  They met or passed other family groups, stiffly armoured for the weeklypenance to a bewildering puzzle of mortality. Ceremonious greetings wereexchanged with these. The day was bright and the world all fair, butthere could be no levity, no social small talk, while this grim businesswas on. They reached the white house of worship, impressive under itsheaven-pointing steeple, and passed within its portals, stepping softlyto the accompaniment of those silken whisperings, with now and again thehigh squeak of new boots whose wearers, profaning the stillness, wouldappear self-conscious and annoyed, though as if silently protestingthat they were blameless.

  Thus began an hour of acute mental distress for the Wilbur twin. He sattightly between Mrs. Penniman and the judge. There was no free movementpossible. He couldn't even juggle one foot backward and forward withoutcorrection. The nervous energy thus suppressed rushed to all the surfaceof his body and made his skin tingle maddeningly. He felt each hair onhis head as it broke away from the confining soap. Something was insidehis collar, and he couldn't reach for it; there was a poignant itchingbetween his shoulder blades, and this could receive no proper treatment.He boiled with dumb, helpless rage, having to fight this wicked unrest.He never doubted its wickedness, and considered himself forever shut outfrom those rewards that would fall to the righteous who loved church andcould sit still there without jiggling or writhing or twisting orscratching.

  He was a little diverted from his tortures by the arrival of theWhipples. From the Penniman pew he could glance across to a side pew andobserve a line of repeated Whipple noses, upon which for some moments hewas enabled to speculate forgetfully. Once--years ago, it seemed tohim--he had heard talk of the Whipple nose. This one had the Whipplenose, or that one did not have the Whipple nose; and it had then beenhis understanding that the Whipple family possessed but one nose incommon; sometimes one Whipple had it; then another Whipple would haveit. At the time this had seemed curious, but in no way anomalous. He hadreadily pictured a Whipple nose being worn now by one and now by anotherof this family. He had visualized it as something that could be handedabout. Later had come the disappointing realization that each Whipplehad a complete nose at all times for his very own; that the phrase bywhich he had been misled denoted merely the possession of a certainbuild of nose by Whipples.

  But even this simple phenomenon offered some distraction from hispresent miseries. He could glance along the line of Whipple noses andobserve that they were, indeed, of a markedly similar pattern. It was,as one might say, a standardized nose, raised by careful selectionthrough past generations of Whipples to the highest point of efficiency;for ages yet to come the demands of environment, howsoever capricious,would probably dictate no change in its structural details. It sufficed.It was, moreover, a nose of good lines, according to conventionalcanons. It was shapely, and from its high bridge jutted forward withrather a noble sweep of line to the thin, curved nostrils. The highbridge was perhaps the detail that distinguished it from most goodnoses. It seemed to begin to be a nose almost from the base of the brow.In a world of all Whipple noses this family would have been remarked forits beauty. In one of less than Whipple noses--with other less claimantdesigns widely popularized--it might be said that the Whipple face wouldbe noted rather for distinction than beauty.

  In oblique profile the Wilbur twin could glance across the fronts inturn of Harvey D. Whipple, of Gideon Whipple, his father; of SharonWhipple, his uncle; and of Juliana Whipple, sole offspring of Sharon.The noses were alike. One had but to look at Miss Juliana to know thatin simple justice this should have been otherwise. She might have kept aWhipple nose--Whipple in all essentials--without too pressing aninsistence upon bulk. But it had not been so. Her nose was as utterlyWhipple as any. They might have been interchanged without detection.

  The Wilbur twin stared and speculated upon and mildly enjoyed thisdisplay, until a species of hypnotism overtook him, a mercifullydeadening inertia that made him slumberous and almost happy. He couldkeep still at last, and be free from the correcting hand of Mrs.Penniman or the warning prod of the judge's elbow. He dozed in a smotherof applied godliness. He was delighted presently to note with anawakening start that the sermon was well under way. He heard no word ofthis. He knew only that a frowning old gentleman stood in a high placeand scolded about something. The Wilbur twin had no notion what hisgrievance might be; was sensible only of his heated aspect, his activityin gesture, and the rhythm of his phrases.

  This influence again benumbed him to forgetfulness, so that during thefinal prayer he was dramatizing a scene in which three large and savagedogs leaped upon Frank and Frank destroyed them--ate them up. And whenhe stood at last for the doxology one of his feet had veritably gone tosleep, the one that had been cramped back under the seat, so that hestumbled and drew unwelcome attention to himself while the foot tingledto wakefulness.

  The ever-tractable Merle had been attentive to the sermon, had sungbeautifully, and was still immaculate of garb, while the Wilbur twinemerged from the ordeal in rank disorder, seeming to have survived ascuffle in which efforts had been made to wrench away his Sunday clothesand to choke him with his collar and cravat. And the coating of soap hadplayed his hair false. It stood out behind and stood up in front, notwith any system, but merely here and there.

  "You are a perfect sight," muttered Winona to him. "I don't see how youdo it." But neither did the offender.

  With a graciously relaxed tension the freed congregation made aleisurely progress to the doors of the church; many lingered here ingroups for greetings and light exchanges. It was here that the Pennimangroup coalesced with the Whipple group, a circumstance that the trailingWilbur noted with alarm. The families did not commonly affiliate, andthe circumstance boded ominously. It could surely not be withoutpurpose. The Wilbur twin's alarm was that the Whipple family hadregretted its prodigality of the day before and was about to demand itsmoney back. He lurked in the shadowy doorway.

  The Whipples were surrounding Merle with every sign of interest. Theyshook hands with him. They seemed to appraise him as if he weresomething choice on exhibition at a fair. Harvey D. was showing the mostinterest, bending above the exhibit in apparently light converse. Butthe Wilbur twin knew all about Harvey D. He was the banker and wore abeard. He was to be seen on week days as one passed the First NationalBank, looking out through slender bars--exactly as the Penniman liondid--upon a world that wanted money, but couldn't have it without somegood reason. He had not been present when the Whipple money was sothoughtlessly loosened, and he would be just the man to make a fussabout it now. He would want to take it back and put it behind those barsin the bank where no one could get it. But he couldn't ever have itback, because it was spent. Still, he might do something with thespender.

  The Wilbur twin slunk farther into friendly shadows, and not until thegroups separated and the four Whipples were in their waiting carriagedid he venture into the revealing sunlight. But no one paid him anyattention. The judge and Mrs. Penniman walked up the shaded street, forthe Sunday dinner must be prepared. Winona and the Merle twin, bothflushed from the recent social episode, turned back to the church tomeet and ignore him.

  "Fortune knocks once at every one's door," Winona was mysteriouslysaying.

  The Wilbur twin knew this well enough. The day before it had knocked athis door and found him in.

  There was still Sunday-school to be endured, but he did not regard thisas altogether odious. It was not so smothering. The atmosphere was lessstraine
d. One's personality could come a bit to the front withoutincurring penalties, and one met one's own kind on a socialplane--subject to discipline, it was true, but still mildly enjoyable.It was his custom to linger here until the classes gathered, but to-daythe Whipple pony cart was driven up by the Whipple stepmother and thegirl with her hair cut off. Apparently no one made these two go tochurch, but they had come to Sunday-school. And the Wilbur twin fledwithin at sight of them. The pony cart, vehicle in which he had beenmade a public mock, was now a sickening sight to him.

  Sunday-school was even less of a trial to him than usual. The twinswere in the class of Winona, and Winona taught her class to-day withunwonted unction; but the Wilbur twin was pestered with few questionsabout the lesson. She rather singled Merle out and made him aninstructive example to the rest of the class, asking Wilbur but twice,and then in sheerly perfunctory routine: "And what great lesson shouldwe learn from this?"

  Neither time did he know what great lesson we should learn from this,and stammered his ignorance pitiably, but Winona, in the throes of somemysterious prepossession, forgot to reprove him, and merely allowed themore gifted Merle to purvey the desired information. So the Wilbur twinwas practically free to wriggle on his hard chair, to exchange noiselessgreetings with acquaintances in other classes, and to watch LymanTeaford, the superintendent, draw a pleasing cartoon of the lesson withcoloured chalk on a black-board, consisting chiefly of a rising yellowsun with red rays, which was the sun of divine forgiveness Once theWilbur twin caught the eye of the Whipple girl--whose bonnet hid hercropped hair--and she surprisingly winked at him. He did not wink back.Even to his liberal mind, it did not seem right to wink in aSunday-school.

  When at last they all sang "Bringing in the Sheaves," and were ablydismissed by Lyman Teaford, who could be as solemn here as he was gay ina parlour with his flute, Winona took the Merle twin across the room togreet the Whipple stepmother and the Whipple girl. Wilbur regarded thescene from afar. Winona seemed to be showing off the Merle twin, causinghim to display all his perfect manners, including a bow lately acquired.

  The Wilbur twin felt no slight in this. He was glad enough to be leftout of Winona's manoeuvres, for he saw that they were manoeuvres andthat Winona was acting from some large purpose. Unless it wanted itsmoney back, the Whipple family had no meaning for him; it was merelypeople with the Whipple nose, though, of course, the stepmother did nothave this. He paused only to wonder if the girl would have it when shegrew up--she now boasted but the rudiments of any nose whatsoever--anddismissed the tribe from his mind.

  He waited for Winona and Merle a block up the street from the church.Winona was silent with importance, preoccupied, grave, and yet uplifted.Not until they reached the Penniman gate did she issue from thisabstraction to ask the Wilbur twin rather severely what lesson he hadlearned from the morning sermon. The Wilbur twin, with immensedifficulty, brought her to believe that he had not heard a word of thesermon. This was especially incredible, because it had dealt with theparable of the prodigal son who spent all his substance in riotousliving. One would have thought, said Winona, that this lesson would havecome home to one who had so lately followed the same bad course, and shesought now to enlighten the offender.

  "And he had to eat with the pigs when his money was all gone," Merlesubmitted in an effort to aid Winona.

  But the Wilbur twin's perverse mind merely ran to the picture of fattedcalf, though without relish--he did not like fat meat.

  It was good to be back in a human atmosphere once more, where he couldhear his father's quips. The Penniman Sunday dinner was based notably onchicken, as were all other Sunday dinners in Newbern, and his father,when he entered the house, was already beginning the gayety by pledgingMrs. Penniman in a wineglass of the Ajax Invigorator. He called it rubyliquor and said that, taken in moderation, it would harm no one, thoughhe estimated that as few as three glasses would cause people to climbtrees like a monkey.

  The Wilbur twin was puzzled by this and would have preferred that hispresent be devoted solely to making a new man of Judge Penniman, but helaughed loyally with his father, and rejoiced when Mrs. Penniman, in thecharacter of the abandoned duchess, put her own lips to the glass at hisfather's urging. The judge did not enter into this spirit of foolery,resenting, indeed, that a sound medicinal compound should be thusimpugned. And Winona was even more severe. Not for her to-day were jestsabout Madame la Marquise and her heart of adamant. Dave Cowan tried afew of these without result.

  Winona was still silent with importance, or spoke cryptically, and shelavished upon the Merle twin such attention as she could give from herown mysterious calculations. One might have gathered that she wasbeholding the Merle twin in some high new light. The Wilbur twin atesilently and as unobtrusively as he could, for table manners wereespecially watched by Winona on Sunday. Not until the blackberry pie didhe break into speech, and even then, it appeared, not with the utmostfelicity. His information that these here blackberries had been pickedoff the grave of some old Jonas Whipple up in the burying ground causedhim to be regarded coldly by more than one of those about the table; andWinona wished to be told how many times she had asked him not to say"these here." Of course he couldn't tell her.

  Dinner over, it appeared that Winona would take Merle with her to callupon poor old Mrs. Dodwell, who had been bedridden for twenty years, butwas so patient with it all. She loved to have Merle sit by her bedsideof a Sunday and tell of the morning's sermon. They would also take her acustard. The Wilbur twin was not invited upon this excursion, but hisfather winked at him when it was mentioned and he was happy. He could inno manner have edified the afflicted Mrs. Dodwell, and the wink meantthat he would go with his father for a walk over the hills--perhaps tothe gypsy camp. So he winked back at his father, being no longer inSunday-school, and was impatient to be off.

  In the little house he watched from a window until Winona and Merle hadgone on their errand of mercy--Merle carrying nicely the bowl of custardswathed in a napkin--and thereupon heartily divested himself of shoesand stockings. Winona, for some reason she could never make apparent tohim, believed that boys could not decently go barefoot on the Lord'sDay. He did not wish to affront her, but neither would he wear shoesand stockings with no one to make him. His bare feet rejoiced at thecool touch of the grass as he waited in the front yard for his father.He would have liked to change his Sunday clothes for the old ones of abetter feel, but this even he felt would be going too far. You had todraw the line somewhere.

  His father came out, lighting his calabash pipe. He wore a tweed cap nowin place of the formal derby, but he was otherwise attired as on theprevious evening, in the blue coal and vivid waistcoat, the inferiortrousers, and the undesirable shoes. As they went down the street undershading elms the dog, Frank, capered at the end of his taut leash.

  They went up Fair Street to reach the wooded hills beyond the town. Thestreet was still and vacant. The neat white houses with green blinds setback in their flowered yards would be at this hour sheltering people whohad eaten heavily of chicken for dinner and now dozed away its benigneffects. Even song birds had stilled their pipings, and made but briefflights through the sultry air.

  Dave Cowan sauntered through the silence in a glow of genial tolerancefor the small town, for Dave knew cities. In Newbern he was but a merrytransient; indeed, in all those strange cities he went off to he was buta transient. So frequent his flittings, none could claim him for itsown. He had the air of being in the world itself, but a transient, acheerful and observant explorer finding entertainment in the manners andcustoms of a curious tribe, its foibles, conceits, and quaint standardsof value--since the most of them curiously adhered to one spot eventhough the round earth invited them to wander.

  Sometimes Dave lingered in Newbern--to the benefit of the _WeeklyAdvance_--for as long as three months. Sometimes he declared he wouldstay but a day and stayed long; sometimes he declared he would stay along time and stayed but a day. He was a creature happily pliant to therule of all his whims. He neve
r bothered to know why he dropped intoNewbern, nor bothered to know why he left. On some morning like othermornings, without plan, he would know he was going and go, stirred bysome vagrant longing for a strange city--and it was so easy to go. Hewas unencumbered with belongings. He had no troublesome packing to do,and took not even the smallest of bags in his farings forth. Unlike thetwins, Dave had no Sunday clothes. What clothes he had he wore, verysensibly, it seemed to him. He had but to go on and on, equipped withhis union card and his printer's steel rule, the sole machinery of histrade, and where he would linger he was welcome, for as long as he choseand at a wage ample for his few needs, to embalm the doings of a queerworld in type. Little wonder he should always obey the wander-bidding.

  They passed a place where the head of the clan, having dined, had beenovertaken with lethargy and in a hammock on his porch was asleep in apublic and noisy manner.

  "Small-town stuff!" murmured Dave, amiably contemptuous.

  The Wilbur twin could never understand why his father called Newbern asmall town. They came to the end of Fair Street, where the white housesdwindled into open country. The road led away from the river and climbedthe gentle slope of West Hill. The Wilbur twin had climbed that slopethe day before under auspices that he now recalled with disgust. Beyond,at the top of the hill, its chimneys lifted above the trees and its redwalls showing warmly through the cool green of its shading foliage, wasthe Whipple New Place. To the left, across the western end of the littletown and capping another hill, was the Whipple Old Place, where dweltSharon Whipple and his daughter, Juliana. The walls of the Whipple OldPlace were more weathered, of a duller red. The two places looked downupon the town quite as castles of old looked down upon theirfeudatories.

  "I was right inside that house yesterday," said the Wilbur twin,pointing to the Whipple New Place and boasting a little--he would nothave to reveal the dreadful details of his entry. "Right inside of it,"he added to make sure that his father would get all his importance. Butthe father seemed not enough impressed.

  "You'll probably go into better houses than that some day," he merelysaid, and added: "You learn a good trade like mine and you can always goanywhere; always make your good money and be more independent thanWhipples or even kings in their palaces. Remember that, Sputterboy."

  "Yes, sir," said Wilbur.

  His father never addressed the Merle twin by any but his rightful name,nor did he ever address the other by the one the dead mother had affixedto him, miscalling him by a number of titles, among which wereSputterboy, Gig, Doctor, and Bill.

  Before ascending quite to the Whipple New Place they left the dusty roadfor a path that led over a lawnlike stretch of upland, starred withbuttercups and tiny anemones, and inhabited by a colony of gophers thatinstantly engaged Frank, the dog, now free of his leash, in futiledashes. They stood erect, with languidly drooped paws, until he was toonear; then they were inexplicably not there. Frank at length divinedthat they unfairly achieved these disappearances by descending intocaverns beneath the surface of the earth. At first, with frantic clawsand eager squeals, he tore at the entrances to these until the preyappeared at exits farther on, only to repeat the disappearance whendashed at. Frank presently saw the chase to be hopeless. It was no gooddigging for something that wouldn't be there.

  "There's life for you, Doctor," said Dave Cowan. "Life has to live onlife, humans same as dogs. Life is something that keeps tearing itselfdown and building itself up again; everybody killing something else andeating it. Do you understand that?"

  "Yes, sir," said Wilbur, believing he did. Dogs killed gophers if theycaught them, and human beings killed chickens for Sunday dinners.

  "Humans are the best killers of all," said Dave. "That's the reasonthey came up from monkeys, and got civilized so they wear neckties andhave religion and post offices and all such."

  "Yes, sir," said Wilbur.

  They climbed to a green height and reclined on the cool sward in theshade of a beech tree. Here they could pick out the winding of the quicklittle river between its green banks far below, and look across theroofs of slumbrous Newbern. The Wilbur twin could almost pick out thePenniman house. Then he looked up, and low in the sky he surprisinglybeheld the moon, an orb of pale bronze dulled from its night shine.Never before had he seen the moon by day. He had supposed it was in thesky only at night. So his father lectured now on astronomy and thecosmos. It seemed that the moon was always there, or about there, alonesome old thing, because there was no life on it. Dave spokelearnedly, for his Sunday paper had devoted a page to something of thissort.

  "Everything is electricity or something," said Dave, "and it cracklesand works on itself until it makes star dust, and it shakes thistogether till it makes lumps, and they float round, and pretty soonthey're big lumps like the moon and like this little ball of star dustwe're riding on--and there are millions of them out there all round andabout, some a million times bigger than this little one, and they allwhirl and whirl, the little ones whirling round the big ones and the bigones whirling round still bigger ones, dancing and swinging and goingoff to some place that no one knows anything about; and some are old andhave lost their people; and some are too young to have any people yet;but millions like this one have people, and on some they are a millionyears older than we are, and know everything that it'll take us amillion years to find out; but even they haven't begun to really knowanything--compared with what they don't know. They'll have to go onforever finding out things about what it all means. Do you understandthat, Bill?"

  "Yes, sir," said Wilbur.

  "Do you understand how people like us get on these whirling lumps?"

  "Yes, sir," said Wilbur.

  "How do they?"

  "No, sir," said Wilbur.

  "Well, it's simple enough. This star dust shakes together, and prettysoon some of it gets to be one chemical and some of it gets to beanother, like water and salt and lime and phosphorus and stuff likethat, and it gets together in little combinations and it makes littleanimals, so little you couldn't see them, and they get together and makebigger animals, and pretty soon they have brains and stomachs--and thereyou are. This electricity or something that shook the star dust togetherand made the chemicals, and shook the chemicals together and made theanimals--well, it's fierce stuff. It wants to find out all about itself.It keeps making animals with bigger brains all the time, so it canexamine itself and write books about itself--but the animals have to begood killers, or something else kills them. This electricity that makes'em don't care which kills which. It knows the best killer will have thebest brain in the long run; that's all it cares about. It's a goodsporty scheme, all right. Do you understand that, Doctor?"

  "Yes, sir," said Wilbur.

  "Everything's got a fair chance to kill; this power shows no favours toanything. If gophers could kill dogs it would rather have gophers; whenmicrobes kill us it will rather have microbes than people. It just wantsa winner and don't care a snap which it is."

  "Yes, sir."

  "Of course, now, you hear human people swell and brag and strut roundabout how they are different from the animals and have something theycall a soul that the animals haven't got, but that's just the naturalconceit of this electricity or something before it has found out muchabout itself. Not different from the animals, you ain't. This tree I'mleaning against is your second or third cousin. Only difference, youcan walk and talk and see. Understand?"

  "Yes, sir," said Wilbur. "Couldn't we go up to the gypsy camp now?"

  Dave refilled the calabash pipe, lighted it, and held the match while itburned out.

  "That fire came from the sun," he said. "We're only burning matchesourselves--burning with a little fire from the sun. Pretty soon itflickers out."

  "It's just over this next hill, and they got circus wagons and a firewhere they cook their dinners, right outdoors, and fighting roosters,and tell your fortune."

  Dave rose.

  "Of course I don't say I know it all yet. There's a catch in it Ihaven't figured out. But
I'm right as far as I've gone. You can't gowrong if you take the facts and stay by 'em and don't read books thatleave the facts to one side, like most books do."

  "Yes, sir," said Wilbur, "and they sleep inside their wagons and I wishwe had a wagon like that and drove round the country and lived in it."

  "All right," said his father. "Stir your stumps."

  They followed the path that led up over another little hill windingthrough clumps of hazel brush and a sparse growth of oak and beech. Fromthe summit of this they could see the gypsy camp below them, in an openglade by the roadside. It was as the Wilbur twin had said: there weregayly-painted wagons--houses on wheels--and a campfire and tetheredhorses and the lolling gypsies themselves. About the outskirts loafed adozen or so of the less socially eligible of Newbern. Above a fire atthe camp centre a kettle simmered on its pothook, being stirred at thismoment by a brown and aged crone in frivolous-patterned calico, who woregold hoops in her ears and bangles at her neck and bracelets of silveron her arms--bejewelled, indeed, most unbecomingly for a person of heryears.

  The Wilbur twin would have lingered on the edge of the glade with otherlocal visitors, a mere silent observer of this delightful life; he hadnot dreamed of being accepted as a social equal by such exalted beings.But his father stalked boldly through the outer ring of spectators tothe camp's centre and genially hailed the aged woman, who, on firstlooking up from her cookery, held out a withered palm for the silverthat should buy him secrets of his future.

  But Dave Cowan merely preened his beautiful yellow moustache at her andsaid, "How's business, Mother?" Whereupon she saw that Dave was not avillager to be wheedled by her patter. She recognized him, indeed, asbelonging like herself to the freemasonry of them that know men andcities, and she spoke to him as one human to another.

  "Business been pretty rotten here," she said as she stirred the kettle'scontents. "Oh, we made two-three pretty good horse trades--nothing much.We go on to a bigger town to-morrow."

  A male gypsy in corduroy trousers and scarlet sash and calico shirt openon his brown throat came to the fire now, and the Wilbur twin admiringlynoted that his father greeted this rare being, too, as an equal. Thegypsy held beneath an arm a trim young gamecock feathered in rich brownsand reds, with a hint of black, and armed with needle-pointed spurs. Hestroked the neck of the bird and sat on his haunches with Dave beforethe fire to discuss affairs of the road; for he, too, divined at aglance that Dave was here but a gypsy transient, even though he spoke adifferent lingo.

  The Wilbur twin sat also on his haunches before the fire, and thrilledwith pride as his father spoke easily of distant strange cities that thegypsies also knew; cities of the North where summer found them, andcities of the South to which they fared in winter. He had always beenproud of his father, but never so proud as now, when he sat theretalking to real gypsies as if they were no greater than any one. He wasquite ashamed when the gypsies' dog, a gaunt, hungry-looking beast,narrowly escaped being eaten up by his own dog. But Frank, at the sheerverge of a deplorable offense, implicitly obeyed his master's commandand forbore to destroy the gypsy mongrel. Again he flopped to his backat the interested approach of the other dog, held four limp paws aloft,and simpered at the stranger.

  Other gypsies, male and female, came to the group about the fire, andlively chatter ensued, a continuous flashing of white teeth and shakingof golden ear hoops and rattling of silver bracelets. The Wilbur twinfondly noted that his father knew every city the gypsies knew, and eventold them the advantages of some to which they had not penetrated. Hegathered this much of the talk, though much was beyond him. He keptclose to his father's side when the latter took his leave of these newfriends. He wanted these people to realize that he belonged to theimportant strange gentleman who had for a moment come so knowingly amongthem.

  As they climbed out of the sheltering glade he was alive with a newdesign. Gypsies notoriously carried off desirable children; this wascommon knowledge in Newbern Center. So why wouldn't they carry off him,especially if he were right round there where they could find himeasily? He saw himself and his dog forcibly conveyed away with thecaravan--though he would not really resist--to a strange and charminglife beyond the very farthest hills. He did not confide this to hisfather, but he looked back often. They followed a path and were soon ona bare ridge above the camp.

  Dave Cowan was already talking of other things, seeming not to have beenever so little impressed with his reception by these wondrous people,but he had won a new measure of his son's respect. Wilbur would havelingered here where they could still observe through the lower trees thegroup about the campfire, but Dave Cowan seemed to have had enough ofgypsies for the moment, and sauntered on up the ridge, across an alderswale and out on a parklike space to rest against a fence that bounded apasture belonging to the Whipple New Place. Across this pasture, inwhich the fat sorrel pony grazed and from which it regarded them fromtime to time, there was another grove of beech and walnut and hickory,and beyond this dimly loomed the red bulk of the Whipple house andoutbuildings. There was a stile through the fence at the point wherethey reached it, and Dave Cowan idly lolled by this while the Wilburtwin sprawled in the scented grass at his feet. He well knew he shouldnot be on the ground in his Sunday clothes. On the other hand, if thegypsies stole him they would not be so fussy as Winona about hisclothes. None of them seemed to have Sunday clothes.

  He again broached the suggestion about a gypsy wagon for himself and hisfather--and Frank, the dog--in which they could go far away, seeing allthose strange cities and cooking their dinner over campfires. His fatherseemed to consider this not wholly impracticable, but there were certaindisadvantages of the life, and there were really better ways. It seemsyou could be a gypsy in all essentials, and still live in houses likeless adventurous people.

  "Trouble with them, they got no trade," said the wise Dave, "and out inall kinds of weather, and small-town constables telling them to move on,and all such. You learn a good loose trade, then you can go where youwant to." A loose trade seemed to be one that you could work at anyplace; they always wanted you if you knew a loose trade like theprinter's--or, "Now you take barbering," said Dave. "There's a goodloose trade. A barber never has to look for work; he can go into any newtown and always find his job. I don't know but what I'd just as soon bea barber as a printer. Some ways I might like it better. You don't haveas much time to yourself, of course, but you meet a lot of men youwouldn't meet otherwise; most of 'em fools to be sure, but some of 'emwise that you can get new thoughts from. It's a cleaner trade thantypesetting and fussing round a small-town print shop. Maybe you'lllearn to be a good barber; then you can have just as good a time asthose gypsies, going about from time to time and seeing the world."

  "Yes, sir," said the Wilbur twin, "and cutting people's hair withclippers like Don Paley clipped mine with."

  "New York, Boston, Buffalo, Chicago, Omaha, Kansas City, Denver, SanAntone," murmured Dave, and there was unction in his tone as he recitedthese advantages of a loose trade--"any place you like the looks of, orplaces you've read about that sound good--just going along with yourlittle kit of razors, and not having to small-town it except when youwant a bit of quiet."

  They heard voices back of them. Dave turned about and Wilbur rose fromthe grass. Across the pasture came the girl, Patricia Whipple, followedat a little distance by Juliana. The latter was no longer in churchgarb, but in a gray tweed skirt, white blouse, and a soft straw hat witha flopping brim. There was a black ribbon about the hat and her stoutshoes were of tan leather. The girl was bare-headed, and Don Paley'srepair of yesterday's damage was noticeable. She came at a quickeningpace, while Juliana followed slowly. Juliana looked severe andformidable. Never had her nose looked more the Whipple nose then whenshe observed Dave Cowan and his son at the stile. Yet she smiledhumorously when she recognized the boy, and allowed the humour to reachhis father when she glanced at him. Dave and Miss Juliana had never beenformally presented. Dave had seen Juliana, but Juliana had had untilthis moment no si
ght of Dave, for though there was in Newbern no socialprejudice against a craftsman, and Dave might have moved in its highestcircles, he had chosen to consort with the frankly ineligible. He liftedhis cap in a flourishing salute as Juliana and Patricia came through thestile.

  "And how are you to-day, my young friend?" asked Juliana of Wilbur inher calm, deep voice.

  The Wilbur twin said, "Very well, I thank you," striving instinctivelyto make his own voice as deep as Juliana's.

  The girl winked at him brazenly as they passed on.

  "Gypsies!" she called, exultantly, and Juliana swept him with a tolerantsmile.

  Dave Cowan watched them along the path to the ridge above the camp. Herethey paused in most intelligible pantomime. Patricia Whipple wished todescend to the very heart of the camp, while Juliana could be seeninforming the child that they were near enough. To make this definiteshe sat upon the bole of a felled oak beside the path while Patriciajiggled up and down in eloquent objection to the untimely halt. Daveread the scene and caressed his thick moustache with practiced thumb andfinger. His glance was sympathetic.

  "The poor old maid!" he murmured. "All that Whipple money, and she hasto be just a small-towner! Say, I bet no one has ever kissed that oldgirl since her mother died! None of these small-town hicks would everhave the nerve to. Yes, sir; any one's got a right to be sorry for thatdame. If she had a little enterprise she'd branch out from here and meeta few people."

  "Yes, sir," said Wilbur. "But that girl wants to go down to the camp."

  This was plain. Patricia still danced, while Juliana remained firmlyseated.

  "I could go take her down," he continued.

  "Why don't you?" said his father, again stroking the golden moustache insympathy for the unconscious Juliana.

  So it befell that the Wilbur twin shyly approached the group by thefelled tree, and the watching father saw the two children, after amoment's hesitancy on the part of Juliana, disappear from view over thecrest of the ridge. Dave continued to loll by the stile and to watch thewaiting Juliana, thinking of gypsies and the pure joy of wandering. Hebegan to repeat some verses he had lately happened upon, murmuring themto a little mass of white clouds far off against the blue of the summersky, where the pale bronze moon lonesomely hung. He liked the words andthe moon and gypsies joyously foot-loose, and he again grew sympatheticfor Juliana's small-town plight. He felt a large pagan tolerance forthose warped souls pent in small towns.

  After twenty minutes of this he faintly heard a call from Juliana, sentafter the children below her. He saw her stand to beckon commandinglyand watch to see if she were obeyed. Then she turned and came slowlyback up the path that would lead to the stile. Again Dave absentlymurmured his verses. Juliana approached the stile, walking briskly now.She was halted by surprising speech from this rather cheaply debonaircreature who looked so nearly like a gentleman and yet so plainly wasnot.

  "Wanted to be off with 'em, didn't you?" Dave was saying brightly; "offand over the edge of the world, all foot-loose and free as wind, goingover strange roads and lying by night under the stars."

  "What?" demanded Juliana sharply.

  She studied the fellow's face for the first time. He was preening hisyellow moustache and flashing a challenge to her from half-shut eyes.

  "Small-towners bound to feel it," he continued, unconscious of anysharpness in Juliana's "What!" "They want to be off and over the edge ofthings, but they don't dare--haven't the nerve. You'd like to, but youdon't dare. You know you don't!"

  Juliana almost smiled. The fellow's face, as she paused beside him atthe stile, was set with sheer impudence, yet this was not whollyunattractive. And amazingly he now broke into verse:

  We, too, shall steal upon the spring With amber sails flown wide; Shall drop, some day, behind the moon, Borne on a star-blue tide.

  He indicated the present moon with flourishing grace as he named it.Juliana did not gasp, but it might have been a gasp in one less than aWhipple. But the troubadour was not to be daunted. Juliana didn't knowDave Cowan as cities knew him.

  Enchanted ports we, too, shall touch; Cadiz or Cameroon; Nor other pilot need beside A magic wisp of moon.

  Again he gracefully indicated our lunar satellite, and again Juliananearly gasped.

  "Of course, you felt it all, watching those people. I don't blame youfor feeling wild."

  Juliana lifted one of her stout tan boots toward the stile, and Davewith doffed cap extended a hand to assist her through. Juliana, dazedbeyond a Whipple calm for almost the first time in her thirty years,found her own hand perforce upon his.

  "You poor thing!" concluded Dave with a swift glance to the ridge wherethe children had not yet appeared.

  Then amazingly he enfolded the figure of the woman in his arms and uponher cold, appalled lips he imprinted a swift but accurate kiss.

  "There, poor thing!" he murmured.

  He lavished one look upon the still frozen Juliana, replaced the capupon his yellow hair, once more preened his moustache at her, and turnedaway to meet the oncoming children. And in his glance Juliana retainedstill the wit to read a gay, cherishing pity. As he turned away she sanklimply against the fence, her first sensation being all of wonder thatshe had not cried out at this monstrous assault. And very clearly sheknew at once that she had not cried out or made any protest because,though monstrous, it was even more absurd. A seasoned sense of humourhad not failed.

  The guilty man swaggered on to meet the children, not looking back. Forhim the incident was closed. Juliana, a hand supporting her capablechin, steadily regarded his swaying shoulders and the yellow hairbeneath his cap. In her nostrils was the scent of printer's ink and pipetobacco. She reflectively rubbed her chin, for it had been stung with aday-old beard that pricked like a nettle. Now she was recalling anotherwoodland adventure of a dozen years before here in this same forest.

  Dave Cowan had been wrong when he said that no one had kissed her sinceher mother died. Once on a winter's day, when she was sixteen, she hadcrossed here, bundled in a red cloak and hood, and a woodchopper, amerry, laughing foreigner who spoke no English, had hailed her gayly,and she had stopped and gayly tried to understand him, and knew onlythat he was telling her she was beautiful. She at least had thought itwas that, and was certain of it when he had seized and kissed her,laughing joyously the while. She had not told any one of that, but shehad never forgotten. And now this curious creature, whom she had notsupposed to be gallantly inclined--unshaven, smelling of printer's inkand tobacco!

  "I'm coming on!" said Juliana aloud, and laughed rather grimly.

  She watched her prankling blade meet the children and go off down theridge with his son, still not looking back. She thought it queer he didnot look back at her just once. She soothed her chin again, sniffing theair.

  Patricia Whipple came leaping up the path, excited with an imminentquestion. She halted before the still-reflective Juliana and went atonce to the root of her matter.

  "Cousin Juliana, what did that funny man kiss you for?"

  This time Juliana in truth did gasp. There was no suppressing it.

  "Patricia Whipple--and did that boy see it, too?"

  "No, he was too far behind me. But I did. I saw it. I was looking rightat you, and that funny man--all at once he grabbed you round your waistand he--"

  "Patricia, dear, listen! We must promise never to say anything aboutit--never to anybody in the world--won't we, dear?"

  "Oh, I won't tell if you don't want me to, but what----"

  "You promise me--never to tell a soul!"

  "Of course! I promise--cross my heart and hope to die--but what did hedo it for?"

  Juliana tried humorous evasion.

  "Men, my dear, are often tempted by women to such lengths--temptedbeyond their strength. Your question isn't worded with all the tact inthe world. Is it so strange that a man should want to kiss me?"

  "Well, I don't know"--Patricia became judicial, scanning the now flushedcountenance of Juliana--"
I don't see why not. But what did he do itfor?"

  "My dear, you'll be honest with me, and never tell; so I'll be honestwith you. I don't know--I really don't know. But I have an awfulsuspicion that the creature meant to be kind to me."

  "He looks like a kind man. And he's the father of the boy that I worehis clothes yesterday when I was running away, and the father of thatother boy that was with him and that I'm going to have one of for myvery own brother, because Harvey D. and grandpa said something of thatkind would have to be done, so what relation will that make us to thisman that was so kind to you?"

  "None whatever," said Juliana, shortly. "And never forget your promisenot to tell. Come, we must go back."

  They went on through the pasture. The shadows had lengthened and themoon already glowed a warmer bronze. Juliana glanced at it and murmuredindistinctly.

  "What is it?" asked Patricia.

  "Nothing," said Juliana. But she had been asking herself: "I wonderwhere he gets his verses?"

  Her hand went again to her chin.