Read Ebook: The four Corners in California by Blanchard Amy Ella Smith Wuanita Illustrator

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Ebook has 1853 lines and 74619 words, and 38 pages

From stable to hen-house; from hen-house to garden; from garden to orchard they had taken their way. Many were the charges Unc' Landy received concerning this hen, that duck; this crop of vegetables, that yield of fruit, and now the final spot was reached and they returned solemnly to the house, a little cast down as they considered how long it would be before they saw each familiar place again.

Leaving the three boys to pass away the time as they should choose till the moment came when they were to escort them to the railway station, the three younger girls hurried up-stairs to make ready for their journey. Nan, however, lingered below for a few moments. She had one more farewell to make. She slipped into the deserted living-room, and going to her piano, her last year's Christmas gift from her grandmother, she opened it, passed her hand lovingly along the keys, and laid her cheek against the shining case. "Good-bye, you precious thing," she whispered. "I wish I could take you with me, but I will come back to you, and there is one good thing about it; you will be exactly the same, no taller, as the boys will be; you will not get rheumatism in your joints, as Unc' Landy may do, and you will seem as young as ever when I come back." After a last loving pat upon the closed lid, she locked the piano and carried the key to Aunt Sarah for safe keeping. Then she went up-stairs to join the others in making ready for their journey.

Mary Lee's bag was neatly packed and Jean had followed her example by stowing away her belongings in an orderly manner, but Jack was pulling open bureau drawers and ransacking every corner for the gloves and handkerchief which she declared she had carefully laid away. "Do help me, Nan," she implored; "the others are so mean and say I am careless and that they will go off without me if I don't hurry. You won't let them leave me behind, will you, Nan?"

"Indeed I will not," said Nan heartily. "Don't fly about so crazily. Sit down for a second and try to think where you last saw the things. What were you doing after you had them?"

Jack plumped herself down on the floor and folded her hands. "I--let me see,--oh, yes, I went down-stairs to see if there were any more caramels. I ate one out of my box and there was a tiny corner that I wanted to fill up."

"Then like as not you left the things in the pantry."

"No, I didn't. I stopped on the way to put them somewhere."

"Have you looked in the living-room?"

"No."

"Then probably that is where they are. Come, let's go down and see if they are there." She led the way to the living-room and there, sure enough, the gloves and handkerchief were found hidden under a book on the table.

"What a place to put them," exclaimed Nan. "That's just like you, Jack. Come along, now. Put your hat on straight; it's over your left ear. The others are all ready. No, don't dive under the sofa for the cat; you'll get all in a mess. Here, you've dropped one of your gloves. Put them both on; it's the only safe way. Of course you'll lose them both before the journey is over, but you may as well start out all right. There are crumbs sticking to your mouth; wipe them off. Coming, mother," and pushing Jack ahead of her she gave one swift glance around the room and joined the group standing on the porch.

The carriage was already waiting at the door. Mary Lee and Jean were seated complacently therein. It was a big, roomy old hack such as the livery stable of the town afforded for the use of the traveling public, and there was space enough for the six of them to be comfortably seated without crowding. Mary Lee leaned back sedately, but Jack and Nan stretched their necks out of the window till the corner was turned, despite the criticism which this performance brought from Mary Lee.

"You look like country jakes," she declared, "as if you had never traveled before. Do take in your heads; people will laugh at you."

"I don't care if they do," responded Nan. "It won't be the first time we have been laughed at, will it, Jack?"

"And it won't be the last, if you are going to keep up this sort of doings," returned Mary Lee with a superior air.

"Oh, don't let's fuss just as we are starting out," put in Jean plaintively; "it takes away all the good taste."

"Well spoken," said Miss Helen. "Do be amiable, you others, and let us go forth with a good taste in our mouths, as Jean says."

In consequence all four smiled sweetly as if to assure one another of their kindly feelings, and even when Nan called to Jack, "Last look, honey," Mary Lee said no word though Jack reached far out to catch a final glimpse of the brown house in its frame of red and yellow autumn leaves.

This last view gave Aunt Sarah on the porch and Unc' Landy leaning on the gate, Trouble at his side looking up wistfully, one ear flopping dejectedly over his eye; it was clear that he understood that something unusual must be the matter when the entire family went off in this stately manner. Their last view of the station showed three lads standing a-row, little Phil craning his neck to look after the departing train, tall Ran waving his hat and Ashby, between the two, shouting something which they did not hear.

"Now, we're really off," said Nan with a sigh of satisfaction. "I have been dreadfully afraid that something would happen to prevent our trip, for it seemed such a tremendously splendid thing for all of us to do. We'll get somewhere, anyhow, even if there should be a railway accident."

"Oh, Nan," said Jean in an expostulatory tone, "what makes you say such a dreadful thing? I didn't want to think about railway accidents and now you've gone and made me."

"Sorry, dearie. I didn't mean to harrow up your sensibilities. There isn't going to be any accident; of course there isn't. Think of how many hundreds and thousands of journeys are taken every day and nobody gets hurt; it is the exception when anything bad happens, and I know it won't this time."

This confidence reassured Jean and she proceeded to unfasten her box of caramels in order to begin the enjoyment of that which was to her an important part of the day's doings.

"Six of us take up a good deal of room," remarked Jack who, as usual, chose to sit by the side of her eldest sister. Mary Lee and Jean were side by side while Mrs. Corner and Miss Helen occupied a third seat. "Just think, Nan, we were never in sleeping cars before," Jack went on.

"In sleeping cars?" exclaimed Nan. "We've scarcely ever been in any cars; I expect we'll get good and tired of them, too, before we get there."

"Oh, but we are to stop off at New Orleans."

"Yes, and other places, too, maybe: Houston and San Antonio, and Mexico, perhaps." She gave Jack a sudden ecstatic squeeze. "Oh, Jack, aren't we lucky to have an Aunt Helen to do all this for us?"

"She ought to do it," said Jack stoutly. "You know she ought to divide with us, for grandmother said it was what grandfather would have wanted her to do."

"Yes, I know that," returned Nan, "but some persons wouldn't have done it."

"She would have been the piggiest kind of a pig to keep it all, when there are five of us and only one of her," insisted Jack.

"All the same," continued Nan, "there are just such human pigs, but Aunt Helen is a darling." Here Nan fell into a fit of dreaming as was a frequent habit of hers, and Jack slipped away to the next seat and squeezed herself in by the side of her twin sister while Nan gazed out of the window and thought of many things. So many changes in one short year. Within that time she had met an unknown grandmother and had encountered her Aunt Helen only a year back, had made her acquaintance without knowing who she was, and had loved her at first sight. Thus had followed the renewal of relations between the old brown house where the Corner girls lived and the big house of Uplands to which the elder Mrs. Corner and her daughter had returned after several years' residence abroad. What a long winter it would have been, Nan reflected, if, while their precious mother was away in the Adirondacks for her health, there had been no Aunt Helen near by. How like a true fairy godmother she had come to them full of gifts which meant so much to a poverty-stricken household. Now Uplands was in ashes and the old brown house, fresh with new paint, was home to all of them except the grandmother whose troubled spirit had left a feeble body the spring before. After long estrangement the sister and wife of John Corner were again dear friends.

Nan looked across at them, at little Aunt Helen's white hair and sweet eyes, at her mother's pale, gentle, lovely face. With a swift movement which she could not resist, Nan rushed across the aisle and bestowed a kiss upon each.

Her mother smiling, turned to Miss Helen. "How like Nan," she said. "I can fancy just what made her do that."

It was growing dark, and the landscape dimmed into large forms of purple mountains and russet plains, softly outlined in the October evening light. "Speeding away, speeding away into a new world," whispered Nan as the train rushed along.

But she was aroused from her dreams by Mary Lee's drawling voice in her ear. "Aunt Helen's called you three times, you old drowsy owl. Come along, we're going to the dining-car for supper."

"Oh, Nan," said Jack reproachfully, "how could you be so forgetful? Why, I've just been sitting here aching for the time to come when we could eat our supper. We never did have a real meal in a real dining-car before. I believe you would have sat there all night and dreamed, if we had let you."

"Night is the time to dream," replied Nan laughing as she bumped along the aisle of the swaying train in the wake of the others.

"Not when you haven't had any supper," returned Jack over her shoulder.

THE OLD GENTLEMAN

It was Jack who made their stay in New Orleans more memorable than it would otherwise have been, for she became possessed of a frantic love of elevators, and, having made friends with the elevator boy, spent most of her time, when she could escape from the others, in riding up and down from the top floor of the hotel to the basement. In consequence of this fancy she was led into a predicament which gave considerable trouble to the entire party.

Miss Helen was conducting the expedition to California, for she was an experienced traveler, but she confessed that Jack was an element such as she never before had been obliged to consider. The trunks had gone on to the station, the carriage was waiting at the door, the bill had been paid, the servants had received their tips, but no Jack appeared. Nan scurried in one direction, Mary Lee in another, Jean in a third. Had any one seen a little girl in brown hat and coat, wandering about the hotel?

"She was all ready to go, for I put on her hat myself," said Mrs. Corner. "What can have become of the child?"

Miss Helen started off to add her powers of search to the others. "We haven't a great deal of time," she remarked.

"Dear, dear, what could have made the child do so?" exclaimed Mrs. Corner, annoyed by the delay.

In a few minutes Jean came running in. "She's in the elevator," she said, "and it's stuck between the fourth and fifth floors, so she can't go up or down."

Then Nan came along followed by Mary Lee. "We've found out where she is, but we can't get at her. What shall we do?" they asked.

"I'm sure I don't know," said Mrs. Corner. "Go find your Aunt Helen, Nan, and tell her what is the matter. We shall have to wait till another train, I am afraid, though it will upset all our arrangements."

There was no help for it; wait they must, for it required some tinkering to free the elevator and its occupants. "Well, I hope you have had enough of elevators," said Mary Lee, as she, with her sisters, greeted the liberated Jack. "You've made Aunt Helen, and all of us, a lot of trouble, for it is too late for our train and we shall have to wait till afternoon."

To which Jack replied smoothly: "Good! then I can go up and down ever so many times more."

"Indeed, you will do nothing of the kind," returned Nan. "You will not get out of our sight again, for who knows but the next time you may have to stay all night between floors. I wouldn't trust to that elevator again."

This suggestion rather dampened Jack's ardor, and she submitted with rather a good grace to her mother's command to take no more elevator rides that day, and she welcomed Nan's suggestion that they go forth to find some pralines for Aunt Helen. "She is so fond of them," said Nan to her mother, "and it will keep Jack out of mischief if I take her to walk."

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