The Wrong Twin Page 6

  CHAPTER VI

  Wilber Cowan went off to bed, only a little concerned by this new-foundflaw in his ancestry. He would have thought it more important could hehave known that this same Cowan ancestry was under analysis at theWhipple New Place.

  There the three existing male Whipples sat about a long,magazine-littered table in the library and smoked and thought and atlong intervals favoured one another with fragmentary speech. Gideon saterect in his chair or stood before the fireplace, now banked with ferns;black-clad, tall and thin and straight in the comely pleasance of hissixty years, his face smoothly shaven, his cheekbones jutting abovedepressed cheeks that fell to his narrow, pointed chin, his blue eyescrackling far under the brow, high and narrow and shaded with rufflinggray hair, still plenteous. His ordinary aspect was severe, almostsaturnine; but he was wont to destroy this effect with his thin-lippedsmile that broke winningly over small white teeth and surprisinglyhinted an alert young man behind these flickering shadows of age. Whenhe sat he sat gracefully erect; when he stood to face the other two, orpaced the length of the table, he stood straight or moved with supplejoints. He was smoking a cigar with fastidious relish, and seemed tocommune more with it than with his son or his brother. Beside SharonWhipple his dress seemed foppish.

  Sharon, the round, stout man, two years younger than Gideon, had thesame blue eyes, but they looked from a face plump, florid, vivacious.There was a hint of the choleric in his glance. His hair had beenlighter than Gideon's, and though now not so plentiful, had grayed lessnoticeably. His fairer skin was bedizened with freckles; and when witha blunt thumb he pushed up the outer ends of his heavy eye-brows orcocked the thumb at a speaker whose views he did not share, it could beseen that he was the most aggressive of the three men. Sharonnotoriously lost his temper. Gideon had never been known to lose his.Sharon smoked and lolled carelessly in a Morris chair, one short, stoutarm laid along its side, the other carelessly wielding the cigar,heedless of falling ashes. Beside the careful Gideon he looked rustic.

  Harvey D., son of Gideon, worriedly paced the length of the room. Hiseyes were large behind thick glasses. He smoked a cigarette gingerly,not inhaling its smoke, but ridding himself of it in little puffs ofdistaste. His brown beard was neatly trimmed, and above it shone hisforehead, pale and beautifully modelled under the carefully parted,already thinning, hair that was arranged in something almost likeringlets on either side. He was neat-faced. Of the three men he carriedthe Whipple nose most gracefully. His figure was slight, not so tall ashis father's, and he was garbed in a more dapper fashion. He wore anexpertly fitted frock coat of black, gray trousers faintly striped, apearl-gray cravat skewered by a pear-headed pin, and his small feet wereincased in shoes of patent leather. He was arrayed as befitted a Whipplewho had become a banker.

  Gideon, his father, achieved something of a dapper effect in anold-fashioned manner, but no observer would have read him for a banker;while Sharon, even on a Sunday evening, in loose tweeds and stout boots,was but a country gentleman who thought little about dress, so that onewould not have guessed him a banker--rather the sort that makes bankinga career of profit.

  Careful Harvey D., holding a cigarette carefully between slender whitefingers, dressed with studious attention, neatly bearded, with shininghair curled flatly above his pale, wide forehead, was the one to lookout from behind a grille and appraise credits. He never acted hastily,and was finding more worry in this moment than ever his years of bankinghad cost him. He walked now to an ash tray and fastidiously trimmed theend of his cigarette. With the look of worry he regarded his father, nowbefore the fireplace after the manner of one enjoying its warmth, andhis Uncle Sharon, who was brushing cigar ash from his rumpled waistcoatto the rug below.

  "It's no light thing to do," said Harvey D. in his precise syllables.

  The others smoked as if unhearing. Harvey D. walked to the opposite walland straightened a picture, The Reading of Homer, shifting its frameprecisely one half an inch.

  "It is overchancy." This from Gideon after a long silence.

  Harvey D. paused in his walk, regarded the floor in front of himcritically, and stooped to pick up a tiny scrap of paper, which hebrought to the table and laid ceremoniously in the ash tray.

  "Overchancy," he repeated.

  "Everything overchancy," said Sharon Whipple after another silence,waving his cigar largely at life. "She's a self-headed little tike," headded a moment later.

  "Self-headed!"

  Harvey D. here made loose-wristed gestures meaning despair, after whichhe detected and put in its proper place a burned match beside Sharon'schair.

  "A bright boy enough!" said Gideon after another silence, during whichHarvey D. had twice paced the length of the room, taking care to bringeach of his patent-leather toes precisely across the repeated pattern inthe carpet.

  "Other one got the gumption, though," said Sharon.

  "Oh, gumption!" said Harvey D., as if this were no rare gift. All threesmoked again for a pregnant interval.

  "Has good points," offered Gideon. "Got all the points, in fact. Goodbuild, good skin, good teeth, good eyes and wide between; nice manners,polite, lively mind."

  "Other one got the gumption," mumbled Sharon, stubbornly. They ignoredhim.

  "Head on him for affairs, too," said Harvey D. He went to a far cornerof the room and changed the position of an immense upholstered chair sothat it was equidistant from each wall. "Other one--hear he took all hissilver and spent it foolishly--must have been eight or ninedollars--this one wanted to save it. Got some idea about the value ofmoney."

  "Don't like to see it show too young," submitted Sharon.

  "Can't show too young," declared Harvey D.

  "Can't it?" asked Sharon, mildly.

  "Bright little chap--no denying that," said Gideon. "Bright as a newpenny, smart as a whip. Talks right. Other chap mumbles."

  "Got the gumption, though." Thus Sharon once more.

  Long silences intervened after each speech in this dialogue.

  "Head's good," said Harvey D. "One of those long heads like father's.Other one's head is round."

  "My own head is round." This was Sharon. His tone was plaintive.

  "Of course neither of them has a nose," said Gideon.

  He meant that neither of the twins had a nose in the Whipple sense, butno comment on this lack seemed to be required. It would be unfair toexpect a true nose in any but born Whipples.

  Gideon Whipple from before the fireplace swayed forward on his toes andwaved his half-smoked cigar.

  "The long and short of it is--the Whipple stock has run low. We're dyingout."

  "Got to have new blood, that's sure," said Sharon. "Build it up again."

  "I'd often thought of adopting," said Harvey D., "in the last twoyears," he carefully added.

  "This youngster," said Gideon; "of course we should never have heard ofhim but for Pat's mad adventure, starting off with God only knows whatvisions in her little head."

  "She'd have gone, too," said Sharon, dusting ashes from his waistcoat tothe rug. "Self-headed!"

  "She demands a brother," resumed Gideon, "and the family sorely needsshe should have one, and this youngster seems eligible, and so--" Hewaved his cigar.

  "There really doesn't seem any other way," said Harvey D. at the table,putting a disordered pile of magazines into neat alignment.

  "What about pedigree?" demanded Sharon. "Any one traced him back?"

  "I believe _his_ father is here," said Harvey D.

  "I know him," said Sharon. "A mad, swearing, confident fellow, reckless,vagrant-like. A printer by trade. Looks healthy enough. Don't seemblemished. But what about his father?"

  "Is the boy's mother known?" asked Harvey D.

  "Easy to find out," said Gideon. "Ask Sarah Marwick," and he went to thewall and pushed a button. "Sarah knows the history of every one,scandalous and otherwise."

  Sarah Marwick came presently to the door, an austere spinster in blackgown and white apron. Her nose, though not Whip
ple in any degree, wasstill eminent in a way of its own, and her lips shut beneath it in astraight line. She waited.

  "Sarah," said Gideon, "do you know a person named Cowan? David Cowan, Ibelieve it is."

  Sarah's mien of professional reserve melted.

  "Do I know Dave Cowan?" she challenged. "Do I know him? I'd know hishide in a tanyard."

  "That would seem sufficient," remarked Gideon.

  "A harum-scarum good-for-nothing--no harm in him. A great talker--makeyou think black is white if you listen. Don't stay here much--in andout, no one knows where to. Says the Center is slow. What do you thinkof that? I guess we're fast enough for most folks."

  "What about his father?" said the stock-breeding Sharon. "Know anythingabout who he was?"

  "Lord, yes! Everybody round here used to know old Matthew Cowan. Livedup in Geneseo, where Dave was born, but used to come round herepreaching. Queer old customer with a big head. He wasn't a regularpreacher; he just took it up, being a carpenter by trade--like our LordJesus, he used to say in his preaching. He had some outlandish kind ofreligion that didn't take much. He said the world was coming to an endon a certain day, and folks had better prepare for it, but it didn't endwhen he said it would; and he went back to carpentering week-days andpreaching on the Lord's Day; and one time he fell off a roof and hit onhis head, and after that he was outlandisher than ever, and they had tolook after him. He never did get right again. They said he died writinga telegram to our Lord on the wall of his room. This Dave Cowan, heargued about religion with the Reverend Mallet right up in the postoffice one day. He'll argue about anything! He's audacious!"

  "But the father was all right till he had the fall?" asked Harvey D. "Imean he was healthy and all that?"

  "Oh, healthy enough--big, strong old codger. He used to say he couldcradle four acres of grain in a day when he was a boy on a farm, orsplit and lay up three hundred and fifty rails. Strong enough."

  "And this David Cowan, his son--he married someone from here?"

  "Her that was Effie Freeman and her mother was a Penniman, cousin to oldJudge Penniman. A sweet, lovely little thing, Effie was, too, just asnice as you'd want to meet, and so--"

  "Healthy?" demanded Sharon.

  "Healthy enough till she had them twins. Always puny after that. Took toher bed and passed on when they was four. Dropped off the tree of lifelike an overfruited branch, you might say. Winona and Mis' Penniman beenmothers to the twins ever since."

  "The record seems to be fairly clear," said Gideon.

  "If he hasn't inherited that queer streak for religion," said Harvey D.,foreseeing a possible inharmony with what Rapp, Senior, would havecalled the interests.

  "Thank you, Sarah--we were just asking," said Gideon.

  "You're welcome," said Sarah, withdrawing. She threw them a last bitover her shoulder. "That Dave Cowan's an awful reader--reads librarybooks and everything. Some say he knows more than the editor of the_Advance_ himself."

  They waited until they heard a door swing to upon Sarah.

  "Other has the gumption," said Sharon. But this was going in a circle.Gideon and Harvey D. ignored it as having already been answered.

  "Well," said Harvey D., "I suppose we should call it settled."

  "Overchancy," said Gideon, "but so would any boy be. This one is anexcellent prospect, sound as a nut, bright, well-mannered."

  "He made an excellent impression on me after church to-day," said HarveyD. "Quite refined."

  "Re-fined," said Sharon, "is something any one can get to be. It'smanners you learn." But again he was ignored.

  "Something clean and manly about him," said Harvey D. "I should likehim--like him for my son."

  "Has it occurred to either of you," asked Gideon, "that this absurdfather will have to be consulted in such a matter?"

  "But naturally!" said Harvey D. "An arrangement would have to be madewith him."

  "But has it occurred to you," persisted Gideon, "that he might be absurdenough not to want one of his children taken over by strangers?"

  "Strangers?" said Harvey D. in mild surprise, as if Whipples could withany justice be thus described.

  Gideon, however, was able to reason upon this.

  "He might seem both at first, I dare say; but we can make plain to himthe advantages the boy would enjoy. I imagine they would appeal to him.I imagine he would consent readily."

  "Oh, but of course," said Harvey D. "The father is a nobody, and theboy, left to himself, would probably become another nobody, withouttraining, without education, without advantages. The father would knowall this."

  "'I CAN ALWAYS FIND A LITTLE TIME FOR BANKERS. I NEVERKEPT ONE WAITING YET AND I WON'T BEGIN NOW.'"]

  "Perhaps he doesn't even know he is a nobody," suggested Sharon.

  "I think we can persuade him," said Harvey D., for once not meaningprecisely what his words would seem to mean.

  "I hope so," said Gideon, "Pat will be pleased."

  "I shall like to have a son," said Harvey D., frankly wistful.

  "Other one has the gumption," said Sharon, casting a final rain of cigarash upon the abused rug at his feet.

  "The sands of the Whipple family were running out--we renew them," saidGideon, cheerily.