She pleaded a headache and went away to her room, while I sat down with Bunch's telegram in my hands and tried to find even a cowpath through the woods.
Uncle Peter came out, none the worse for his cold plunge, and sat down near me.
"Ah, my boy, isn't this delightful!" he cried, drinking in the air. "There's nothing like the country, I tell you! Look at that view! Isn't it grand? John, to be frank with you, up until I saw this place I didn't have much faith in your ability as a business man, but now I certainly admire your wisdom in selecting a spot like this—what did it cost you?"
Cost me! so far it had cost me an attack of nervous prostration, but I couldn't tell him that. I hesitated for the simple reason that I hadn't the faintest idea what the place had cost Bunch. I had been too busy to ask him.
"It's all right, John," the old fellow went on; "don't think me inquisitive. A rubberneck is the root of all evil. It's only because I've been watching you rather closely since we came out here and you seem to be nervous about something. I had an idea maybe it took all your ready money to buy the place, and possibly you regret spending so much—but don't you do it! The best day's work you ever did was when you bought this place!"
"Yes, I believe you!" I sighed, wearily, as I turned to look down the road.
I stiffened in the chair for I saw my finish in the outward form of two women rapidly approaching the house,
"It's Bunch's sister and her daughter," I moaned to myself. "Well,
I'll be generous and let the blow fall first on Uncle Peter!"
Accordingly, I made a quick exit,
In the kitchen I found Clara J., her headache forgotten, busily preparing to cook the dinner.
She's a foxy little bundle of peaches, that girl is; and I was wise to the fact that her suspicion factory was still working over-time, turning out material for the undersigned.
I felt it in my bones that the steer I gave her about Aunt Eliza had been placed in cold storage for safe keeping.
Her brain was busy running to the depot to meet the scandal Bunch's telegram hinted at, but she pretended to catch step and walk along with me.
"John," she said, "I certainly do hope your relatives won't come out for some little time, because we really aren't ready for visitors, now are we, dear?"
"Indeed we are not," I groaned.
"I can't help thinking it awfully strange that you should be notified of their coming by Mr. Jefferson, and in such peculiar language," she said, after a pause.
"Didn't I tell you Bunch is a low comedian," I said, weakly.
"Besides, he knows them very well. Aunt Fanny is very fond of
Bunch."
"Aunt Fanny," she repeated, dropping a tin pan to the floor with a crash; "I thought you said her name was Eliza?"
"Sure thing!" I chortled; while my heart fell off its perch and dropped in my shoes. "Her name is Eliza Fanny; some of us call her Aunt Eliza, some Aunt Fanny—see?"
She hadn't time to see, for at that moment Tacks rushed in, exclaiming, "Say, sister, they's two strange women on the piazza talking to Uncle Peter, and maybe when they go one of them will fall down the steps if I put some more soap there!"
Like a whirlwind he was gone again. Clara J. simply looked at me queerly and said, "The queens are here; treat them white, John!"
I felt as happy as a piece of cheese.
CHAPTER VI.
JOHN HENRY^S TWO QUEENS.
"Well!" said Clara J., after a painful pause, "why don't you go and welcome your Aunt Eliza?"
Aunt Lize would be the central figure in a hot old time if she went where I wished her at that moment.
Somebody had tied both my feet to the floor.
I had visions of two excited females lambasting me with umbrellas and demanding their property back.
Completely at a loss I sank into a chair, feeling as bright and chipper as a poached egg.
I felt that I belonged just about as much as a knothole does in a barb-wire fence.
In that few minutes Bunch was more than revenged.
I was on the pickle boat for sure.
Sailing! sailing! over the griddle, me!
Scientists tell us that when a man is drowning every detail of his lifetime passes before him in the fraction of a second.
Well, that moving picture gag was worked on me, without the aid of a bathing suit.
When I awoke, Clara J. was saying, "Possibly it would look better if I went with you. Wait just a moment, till I get this apron off—there! come along!"
I arose, and with delightful unanimity the chair arose also, clinging like a passionate porusplaster to my pantaloons.
"Mercy'" exclaimed Clara J., "that little villain, Tacks, has been making molasses candy!"
"It strikes me," I said, trying hard to be calm, "that after making the candy he decided to make a monkey of me. Darn the blame thing, it won't let go! I suppose I've got to be a perpetual furniture mover the rest of my life!"
Just then Uncle Peter came bubbling into the kitchen, talking in short explosions like a bottle of vichy, and I collaborated with the chair in a hasty squatty-vous!
"Two women on the piazza," he fizzed; "been talking to them an hour and all I could get out of them was 'yes' and 'no.' Not bad looking, but profoundly dumb."
"Hush!" said Clara J., glancing uneasily at me and then back at
Uncle Peter, as she raised a warning finger to her lips.
"Oh, they can't hear me," the old gentleman went on; "John, you better go out and see them. They have a card with your name written on it. I'm no lady's man, anyhow."
"Do they look like queens?" Clara J. asked, uneasily.
"Well, they aren't exactly Cleopatras, but not bad, not bad!" he gurgled.
"Is one older than the other?" Clara J. cross-questioned.
"Might be mother and daughter," Uncle Peter fancied.
"It's surely Bunch's bunch," I groaned inwardly, wondering how I'd look galloping across the country with a kitchen chair trailing along behind.
"Uncle Peter, it must be John Henry's Aunt Eliza and cousin Julia. He expects them, don't you, John?" Clara J. explained. "We shall be ready to welcome them in just a little while;" here she glanced cautiously at the chair. "In the meantime you show them into the spare room and say that John will see them very soon."
The old gentleman eyed me suspiciously and retired without a word.
I'm afraid Uncle Peter found it hard to take.
With the kind assistance of the carving knife Clara J. removed all of me from the chair, with the exception of a few feet of trousers, and I made a quick change of costume.
A few minutes later I joined her in the parlor, where the scene was set for my finish. I picked out a quiet spot near the piano to die.
Uncle Peter was enjoying every minute of it.
He hurried off to escort the visitors to the parlor and a moment later Aunt Martha bustled in.
"Are they here?" she asked breathlessly.
"How did you know they were coming?" inquired Clara J. in surprised tones.
"How did I know!" exclaimed Auntie; "why I sent them!"
Every hand was against me. The parachute had failed to work and I was dropping on the rocks.
Faintly and far away I could hear the ambulance coming at a gallop.
Sweet spirits of ammonia, but I was up against it!
It was plainly evident to me that Aunt Martha knew the awful relatives of Bunch, and that the old lady was camping on my trial. Yes; there she stood, old Aunt Nemesis, glaring at me from behind her spectacles.
I decided to die without going over near the piano.
"Where are they?" I could hear Aunt Martha asking in the same tone of voice I was certain the Roman Emperor used when just about to frame up a finale for a few Christians from over the Tiber.
"Uncle Peter has gone for them; we put them in the spare room," answered Clara J.
"What! in the spare room!" gasped Aunt Martha, collapsing in a chair just as Uncle Peter appeared in the doorway, bowing low before the visitors, who stalked clumsily into the parlor.
For some reason or other Clara J. omitted the formality of springing forward and greeting my relatives effusively, so she simply said, "You are very welcome, Aunt Eliza and cousin Julia!"
"Great heavens! what does this mean?" shrieked Aunt Martha. "It cannot be possible that these two women are relatives of yours, John! Why, I engaged them both in an intelligence office; one for the kitchen, the other as parlor maid!"
"Sure not," I chirped, in joy-freighted accents, as I grasped the glorious situation. "They aren't my relatives and never were. The more I look at them the more convinced I am that there's no room for them to perch on my family tree. I disown them both. Back to the woods with the Swede imposters!"
I win by an eyelash.
I was so happy I went over to the mantel and began to bite the bric-a-brac.
Clara J. didn't know whether to laugh or cry, so she compromised by giggling at Uncle Peter, who sat on the piano stool whirling himself around rapidly and muttering, "any kind of exercise is good exercise."
Aunt Martha stared around the room from one to another in speechless amazement, while the two innocent causes of all the trouble stood motionless, with their noses tip-tilted to the ceiling.
Presently Aunt Martha broke the spell just as I was about to eat a cut-glass vase in the gladness of my heart.
"Go to the kitchen!" she said sharply to the newcomers, whereupon they both turned in unison and looked the old lady all over. Finally they decided to discharge Aunt Martha, for the oldest member of the troupe folded her arms decisively and said, "Sure, it ain't in any lunatic asylum I'll be afther livin', bless th' Saints! If yez have a sinsible moment left in your head will yez give us th' car fare back to th' city, and it'll be a blessed hour for me whin I plants me feet on th' ferryboat, so it will!"
Uncle Peter checked the fiery course of the piano stool and began to make his double chin do a gurgle, whereupon the youngest of the two female impersonators handed him a glare that put out his chuckle and he started the piano stool again at the rate of 45 revolutions per minute.
"Th' ould buffalo over there showed us up to th' spare room, thinkin' to be funny," she who was fated never to be our cook, went on, "and if I wasn't in a daffy house and him nothin' but a bug it's the weight of that chair he'd feel over his bald spot. Th' ould goosehead, to set us down on th' porch and talk to us for an hour about th' landshcape and th' atmusphere, and to ask me, a respectable lady, what kind of exercise I was partial to! It's a Hiven's own blessin' I didn't hand him a poke in th' slats, so it is!"
Uncle Peter, with palpably assumed indifference, slid off the piano stool and faded behind the furthermost window curtain, while I went up to the belligerent visitor and said, "On your way, Gismonda; the referee gives the fight to you; here's the gate receipts!"
With this I handed her a ten-spot which she looked at suspiciously and said, "If ever I get that ould potato pounder over in New York it's exercise I'll give him! Sure, I'll run him from th' Bat'hry to Harlem widout a shtop for meals, bad cess to him!"
Having delivered this parting knock at Uncle Peter, the queen of the kitchen flounced out of the house, followed by the younger one who had played only a thinking part in the strenuous scene.
Aunt Martha still sat motionless in the chair, quite on the verge of tears, when Clara J. went over to her and said, "Why didn't you tell me you were going after servants, Auntie?"
"I wanted to surprise you," the old lady replied, plaintively.
"They were to be my contribution to the household."
"You handed us a surprise, all right; didn't she, Uncle Peter?" I chirped in with a view to laughing off the whole affair, but just then a series of startling shrieks caused us all to rush for the piazza.
At the gate we beheld a kicking, struggling mass of lingerie and bad dialect, which presently resolved itself into the forms of my temporary relatives who were now busily engaged in macadamizing the roadway with their heads.
Then Tacks came yelling on the scene: "I thought maybe they was female burglars so I stretched a wire acrost the gate and they was in such a hurry getting away that they never noticed it till it was too everlastingly late!"
Before we could remonstrate with the Boy-Disaster he let another whoop out of him and darted off in the direction of the barn.
That whoop brought the two wire-tappers to their feet and after they both shook their fists eagerly in our direction they started in frenzied haste for the depot.
As they scurried frantically out of our neighborhood Uncle Peter smiled blandly and murmured, "For lecturers, female reformers and all those who lead a sedentary life there's nothing like exercise!"
Putting my arm around Clara J.'s waist I whispered, "Didn't I tell you it was one of Bunch's put-up jobs? He's jealous because I'm so happy out here with you, that's all! As for the telegram, forget it!"
"All right, John," said Clara J., "but nevertheless that same telegram gave you a busy day, didn't it?"
"It surely did, but it was only because I hated to have you worried," I answered as she went in the house to console Aunt Martha.
I sat down in a chair expecting every moment to have the Prince of
Liars come up and congratulate me.
Humming a tune quietly to himself Uncle Peter watched the flying squadron disappear in a bend of the road, then he sat down near me and said, "John, you're worried about something and I've a pretty fair idea what it is. This property is too big a load for you to carry, eh?"
From the depths of my heart I replied, "It certainly is!"
"Well," said the old gentleman, "it surely has made a hit with me. I never struck a place I liked half as well as this. How would you like to sell it to me, then you and Clara J. could live with us, eh? Come on, now, what d'ye say?"
I sat there utterly unable to say anything.
"What did it cost you; come on, now, John?" the old fellow urged.
"Oh, about $14,000," I whispered, picking out the first figure I could think of.
"It's worth it and more, too," he said. "I'll give you $20,000 for it—say the word!"
"Well, if you insist!" I replied, weakly; and the next minute he danced off to write me a check.
In the tar barrel every time I opened my mouth! Hard luck was certainly putting the wrapping paper all over me.
Well, the only thing to do now was to hustle up to town in the morning and inform Bunch that I had sold his property.
I felt sure he'd be tickled to a stand-still—not!
CHAPTER VII.
JOHN HENRYS HAPPY HOME.
Early the next morning I broke camp and took the trail to town, determined never to come back alive unless Bunch agreed to sell the plantation to Uncle Peter.
The old gentleman had crowded his check for $20,000 into my trembling hands the night before with instructions to deposit it in my bank, and at my convenience I was to let him have the deed to the place.
Well, if Bunch should refuse to play ball I could send the check back to Uncle Peter, and a telegram to Clara J., telling her that I was back in the flat, laid up with a spavined fetlock or something.
Uncle Peter was out in the garden planting puree of split peas or some other spring vegetable when I started for the train, so all the Recording Angel had to put down against me was the new batch of Ochiltrees I told Clara J.
I soon located Bunch, and to my surprise found him more inclined to josh than to jolt.
[Illustration: Bunch Jefferson—All to the Good and Two to Carry.]
"Ah! my friend from the bush!" he exclaimed; "are you in town to buy imitation coal, or is it to get a derrick and hoist your home affairs away from my property? Why don't you take a tumble, John, and let go?"
"Bunch," I said, "believe me, this is the crudest game of freeze-out I ever sat in. My throat is sore from singing, 'Father, dear father, come home with me now!' and every move I make nets me a new ornamentation on my neck. Why didn't I tell the good wife that the ponies put the crimp in my pocketbook instead of crawling into this chasm of prevarication and trouble?"
"You can search me!" Bunch answered, thoughtfully.
"And that phony wire you sent me yesterday almost gave me a plexus," I said bitterly. "Why did you frame up one of those when-we-were-twenty-one dispatches from the front? It sounded like a love song from Willie Hayface of Cohoes, after his first day on Broadway. Didn't you know that my wife was liable to open that queer fellow and put me on the toasting fork?"
Bunch blinked his eyes solemnly, but when I told him all about the trouble his telegram had caused he simply rose up on his hind legs and laughed me to a sit down.
"Well," he gasped after a long fit of cackling; "sister did intend going out to Jiggersville and the only way I could stop her was to suddenly discover that her health wasn't any too good, so I chased her off to Virginia Hot Springs for a couple of weeks."
After all, Bunch had his redeeming qualities.
"I sent you that wire before I took sister's temperature," Bunch explained, "and I quite forgot to send another which would put a copper on the queens."
Once more he laughed uproariously and chortled between the outbursts, "Now—ha, ha, ha!—I'm even for—ha, ha, ha!—for that shoot the chute I did in your—ha, ha, ha—in your cellar—oh! ha, ha, ha, ha!"
"Oh, quit your kidding!" I begged, and then, suddenly, "Say, Bunch, will you sell the old homestead?"
Bunch stopped laughing and looked me over from head to foot. "Is this on the level or simply another low tackle?"
"It's the goods," I answered: "I simply can't frighten, coax, scare, drive or push my home companions away from your property, so I'd like to buy it if you're game to cut the cards?"
"Been playing the lottery?" he snickered.
"No, but I have the Pierponts, all right, all right," I replied; "will you put $14,000 in your kick and pass me over the baronial estate?"
"Fourteen thousand!" Bunch repeated slowly. "Sure, I will. If you can Morgan that amount I'll make good with the necessary documents, and then you and your family troubles may sit around on fly paper in Jiggersville for the rest of your natural lives for all I care."
I explained to Bunch that I wanted the deed made out in the name of Peter Grant for the reason that Uncle Peter was a bigger farmer than I, and in short order the preliminary arrangements were completed to the satisfaction and relief of both parties concerned.
That evening I went back to Jiggersville feeling as light as a pin feather on a young duck.
Uncle Peter could have the property; Bunch could buy his sister another castle, and I was ahead of the game just $6,000, more than enough to square me for all the green paper I had torn up at the track.
Of course, it did look as though Uncle Peter had been whipsawed, but when I considered the bundles the old gentleman had stored away in the vaults, and when I remembered his eagerness to cough, I simply couldn't produce one pang of conscience.
Two days later Bunch had a certified check for $14,000 and Uncle
Peter was the happy owner of the country estate.
"We will live with you and Aunt Martha a little while," I said to him; "but if you have no objection I'd like to buy a small lot down near the brook from you and build a bit of a cage there for ourselves."
Uncle Peter chuckled affirmatively, but seemed unwilling to continue the subject further. "Isn't it glorious out here," he smiled. "Pure air, fresh from the bakery of Heaven! I have younged myself ten years since we came out here. Yesterday I fell in a bear trap which Tacks had dug and carefully concealed with brush and leaves. It took me four hours to get out because I'm rather stout, but the exercise surely did me good."
Can you beat him?
A week later the second anniversary of our wedding would roll around, and although Clara J. was a trifle hard to win over, I finally coaxed her to let me have Bunch out to spend a few hours with us on that occasion.
At the appointed hour Bunch arrived and Clara J. greeted him with every word of that telegram darting forth darkly from her eyes.
"Mrs. John," said Bunch, "I'm simply delighted to know you. I've often heard your husband speak well of you."
She had to smile in spite of herself.
"Mrs. John," Bunch went on, with splendid assurance; "you should be proud of this matinee idol husband of yours, for, to tell you the truth, he's all the goods—he certainly is."
Clara J. looked somewhat embarrassed, and as for me, I was away out to sea in an open boat. I hadn't the faintest idea what Bunch was driving at.
"You surely have a wonderful influence over him," the lad with the blarney continued. "A week or so ago I threw some bait at him just to test him and he didn't even nibble. You know, in the old days John and I often trotted in double harness to the track—bad place for young men—sure!"
Bunch surveyed the property with a quick glance and said, "Yes, I sent John a telegram. 'The two queens will be out this afternoon,' I wired, meaning two horses that simply couldn't lose. 'They are good girls, so treat them white,' I told him, meaning that he should put up his roll on them and win a hatfull; but, Mrs. John, I never touched him. He simply ignored my telegram and sat around in the hammock all day, reading a novel, I suppose. I apologize to you, Mrs. John, for trying to drag him away from the path of rectitude, but, believe me, I didn't know when I sent the message that he had promised you to give the ponies the long farewell!"
Clara J. laughed with happiness, all her doubts dispersed, and said, "Oh, don't mention it, Mr. Bunch! I'm simply delighted to welcome you to our new home. You have never been out here before, have you?"
Bunch glanced at me, then through the open front door in the direction of the scene of his downfall, and said, hesitatingly, "Never before, thank you, kindly!"
Good old Bunch. He had squared me with my wife and the world—oh, well, some day, perhaps, I'd get a chance to even up.
"John," he said, a few minutes later, when we took a short stroll around the place. "Now that I've started in to tell the whole truth I musn't skip a paragraph. This is a pleasant bit of property, but the solemn fact remains that I put the boots to you. I gave you the gaff for $6,000, old friend, and it breaks my heart to tell you that I'm not sorry. Bunch for Number One, always!"
"What do you mean?" I asked.
"This farm only cost me $8,000," he said, giving me the pitying grin.
"It cost me $14,000 and I sold it for $20,000," I said, slowly.
We stopped and shook hands.
"Who's the come-on?" he asked, presently.
"Uncle Peter," I answered, "but the old boy has so much he has to kick a lot of it out of the house every once in a while, so it's all right."
After dinner we were all sitting on the piazza listening to a treatise from Uncle Peter on the subject of the growth and proper care of wheat cakes, or asparagus, I forget which, when suddenly the cadaverous form of the Sherlock Holmes of Jiggersville appeared before us.
"Evenin' all!" bowed Harmony Diggs, clinging tightly to a bundle which he held under his arm.
"Find that robber yet?" inquired Bunch, winking at me.
"That's just what I dropped around for to tell you, thinkin' maybe you'd be kinder interested in knowin' the facts in the case," Harmony went on, carefully placing the precious bundle on the steps.
"I got a clue from this here gent," he said, pointing a bony finger at Bunch, "and I ups and chases that there maleyfactor for four miles, well knowin' that the cause of justice would suffer and the reward of fifty dollars be nil and voidless if the critter got away. But I got him, by crickey, I got him!"
He looked from one to the other, seeking a sign of applause, and
Bunch said, "Where did you catch him?"
"About four miles yonder," Diggs explained, indefinitely. "It was a fierce fight while it lasted, but they ain't no maleyfactor livin' can escape the clutches of these here hands oncet they entwines him. I pulled the dem cuss out of his clothes!"
With this thrilling announcement he opened the bundle and proudly displayed the burglar harness which Bunch had worn on that memorable night.
"And the burglar himself?" Bunch questioned.
Diggs raised his head slowly, and with theatrical effect answered, "I give the cussed scoun'rel the doggonest drubbin' a mortal maleyfactor ever got and let him go. That was nearly two weeks ago, and he ain't showed up since, dag him!"
"You win, Mr. Ananias!" said Bunch, handing Diggs a ten dollar bill, as he whispered to me, "That story is worth the money."
"What's that for?" inquired Diggs, somewhat taken aback.
"That's my contribution to the reward for the robber," Bunch told him.
"Well," spluttered Diggs; "it don't seem zactly right, seein' as how I on'y pulled the cuss out of his clothes and then let him go with a lambastin'."
"The ten-spot is for the clothes you pulled him out of," Bunch said, picking up the garments and handing them to me. "Keep them, John, as a souvenir of your first burglar—and true friend, Bunch!"
I took them reverently, and said, "For your sake, Bunch, they'll be handed down from generation to generation."
Clara J. blushed and said, "Oh, John!" and I thought Uncle Peter would chuckle himself into a delirium.
"Good-night, Mr. Ananias!" Bunch called, as Diggs made a farewell bow and turned to go.
"Good-night, one and all," replied Diggs, then a thought struck him and he turned with, "Say, who's this here Mr. Annienias? Seems like the name's familiar, but it ain't mine."
"Mr. Ananias is the first detective mentioned in history," Bunch explained, and Mr. Diggs beamed over us all.
"Wait a moment, Mr. Officer," Aunt Martha piped in; "have a drop of refreshment before you go. Tacks, run in and pour Mr. Officer a drink from that bottle on the sideboard!"
Diggs stood there swallowing his palate in delightful anticipation until Tacks handed him a brimming glass from which the brave thief-taker took one eager mouthful, whereupon he emitted a shriek of terror that could be heard for miles.
"Water! water! quick! I'm a'burnin' up!" cried the astonished
Diggs.
Uncle Peter in his eagerness to quench the flames poured half a pitcher full of ice water down the back of Diggs' neck.
"It ain't there, it's down my throat!" yelled the unfortunate Harmony, whereupon Uncle Peter poured the rest of the ice water over the constable's head.
When, finally, the old fellow was revived he faintly declined any more refreshment, and with a sad "good-night," faded away in the twilight.
"Gee!" exclaimed Tacks, as he watched the retreating form, "I'm afraid I upset some tobascum sauce in that glass by mistake."
Presently, Bunch went off to the depot to take a train back to the city, and for some little time we sat in silence on the piazza.
"Grand, isn't it?" Uncle Peter said, breaking the spell. "Couldn't be any nicer, now, could it?" Then he went over and stood near Clara J.
"Little woman," he said; "ever since we first talked of moving out here I noticed how worried John was."
"So did I," she answered, taking my hand in hers.
"A day or two ago I found out what the trouble was," the old gentleman continued; "this property was too heavy a load for a young man to carry, especially when he's just married, so I bought it from him!"
Before Clara J. could express a word Uncle Peter put his arm around Aunt Martha's waist and continued, "Aunt Martha and I talked it all over last night and in celebration of your second anniversary we want you to accept this little present," and with this he placed a document in Clara J.'s hands.
"It's the deed to the property," Aunt Martha said, "all for you,
Clara J., but if you don't mind, we'd like to live here!"
"Yes," said Uncle Peter; "that garden certainly needs someone to look after it!"
Clara J. was crying softly and hugging Aunt Martha,
My own eyes were damp and I yearned to have somebody run the lawn mower over me.
"I'll race you down to the gate and back," I suggested.
"You're on," laughed Uncle Peter; "I believe I do need a little exercise!"