Janice Day

CHAPTER XII

ON THE ROAD WITH WALKY DEXTER

Janice Day found the weeks sliding by more quickly after this. Although school soon closed, she had begun to find so many interests in Poketown that she could now write dear Daddy in Mexico quite cheerful letters.

She had "kept at" Hopewell Drugg until his store was the main topic of conversation all over town. The man himself was even "spruced up" a bit, and he met the curious people who put themselves out to see his rejuvenated store with such a pleasant and businesslike air, that many new customers were attracted to come again.

Neatly printed announcements had been scattered about Poketown, signed by Hopewell Drugg, and making a bid for a share of the general trade. His windows remained attractively dressed. He displayed new stock and up-to-the-minute articles. The drummers who came to Poketown began to pay more attention to this store on the side street.

But Janice Day believed, that, like charity, reformation should begin at home. The old Day house was slowly revolutionized that summer. Commencing with the cleaning up of the yard and the mending of the pump, Janice inspired further improvements. Marty and she spent each Saturday morning in the dooryard and garden, while Mr. Day mended the front porch flooring, where the minister had met with his accident, and reshingled the roof.

The boles of the fruit and shade trees about the house were whitewashed, and the palings of the fence renewed. Somehow a pair of new hinges were found for the gate. The sidewalk was raked, all the weeds cut away from the fence-line, and the sod between the path and the gutter trimmed and its edges cut evenly.

When Marty actually whitewashed the fence, Mr. Day admitted that it was such an improvement he wished he could go on and paint the house. "But, by mighty!" he drawled, "it's been so long since 'twas painted, it 'ud soak up an awful sight of oil."

Other people along Hillside Avenue began to take notice of the improvement about the old Day house. Mr. Dickerson built a new front fence, getting it on a line with the Days' barrier. Others trimmed hedges and trees, put the lawn mower to their grass, bolstered up sagging fences, and rehung gates. Hillside Avenue, up its whole length, began to look less neglected.

Janice had a fondness for the little inlet, with its background of tall firs, where she had first met little Lottie Drugg, and she often walked down there. So she became pretty well acquainted with "Mr. Selectman" Cross Moore. But as yet she did not get as far out on the Middletown Lower Road as the house where the Hammett Twins lived.

One day she found a long lumber-reach dropping new posts and rails along the length of the deep ditch into which the twins' pony had come so near to backing the little old ladies on that memorable day when Janice had first met them.

"Hi tunket!" ejaculated Mr. Moore, grinning in a most friendly way at Janice, "I hope you'll be satisfied now. You've jest about hounded me into havin' this fence put up again."

"Why, Mr. Moore! I never said a thing to you about it," cried the girl.

"No. But I see ye ev'ry time you go by, and I'm so reminded of the 'tarnal fence that I remember it o' nights. If somebody should fall inter the ditch, ye know. And then—Well, I've found out you've made little Lottie Drugg promise not to come down this way 'nless somebody's with her. 'Fraid she'll fall in here, too, I s'pose——"

"Well, she might," said Janice, firmly.

"She won't have no chance," growled Mr. Moore, but with twinkling eyes in spite of his gruffness. "Hi tunket! I'll build a railing along here that'll hold up an elephunt."

This day Janice had set forth for a long jaunt into the country. She took the turn where the Hammett Twins and their pony had first come into her sight, and kept walking on the Middletown Lower Road for a long way. It overlooked the lake, Janice had been told, for most of the distance to the larger town.

She passed several farmhouses but did not reach the Hammett place; instead she rested upon a rustic bridge where a swift, brawling brook came down from the hills to tumble into the lake. Then, as she was going on, a quick "put, put, put" sounded from along the road she had been traveling.

"It's a motorcycle," thought Janice. "I didn't know anybody owned one around Poketown."

Turning the bend in the road the 'cycle flashed into view, along with a whisp of dust. A young man rode the machine—a young man who looked entirely different from the youths of Poketown. Janice looked at him with interest as he flashed past. She thought he was going so fast that he would never notice her curiosity.

He was muscularly built, with a round head set firmly upon a solid neck, from which his shirt was turned well away, thus displaying the cords of his throat to advantage. He was well bronzed by the sun, and the heavy crop of hair, on which he wore a visorless round cap, was crisp and of a dull gold color. He really was a good-looking young man, and in his knickerbockers and golf stockings Janice thought he seemed very "citified" indeed.

"He's a college boy, I am sure," decided the girl, with interest, watching the rider out of sight. "I couldn't see his eyes behind those dust glasses; but I believe there was a dimple in his cheek. If his face was washed, I don't doubt but what he'd be good-looking," and she laughed. "Why! here's Walky Dexter!"

The red-faced driver of the "party wagon" drew in Josephus and his mate, with a flourish.

"Wal, now! I am beat," he ejaculated, his little eyes twinkling. "Can't be I've found a lost Day?"

"No, indeed, Mr. Dexter," she told him. "I was thinking I'd walk to the Hammetts'; but it's turned so hot and dusty——"

"And the Hammett gals live two good mile ahead o' ye."

"Oh! as far as that?"

"Surest thing ye know. Better hop in an' jog along back 'ith me," said Walkworthy Dexter, cordially.

"Can I, Mr. Dexter?"

"You air jest as welcome as the flowers in May," he assured her. "Whoa, Josephus. Stand still, Kate! My sakes! but the flies bite the critters this morning, an' no mistake."

Janice "hopped in," and Mr. Dexter clucked to the willing horses.

"I jest been takin' a party of our young folks over to Middletown to take examinations for entrance to the Academy," proclaimed Walky. "An' that remin's me," added he. "Did yer see that feller go by on one o' them gasoline bikes?"

"On the motorcycle?"

"Ya-as."

"I saw him," admitted Janice.

"Know him?"

"Of course not. He doesn't belong in Poketown, I'm sure."

"Mebbe he will," said Walky, his eyes twinkling with fun again.

Janice looked at him, puzzled.

"Ain't you heard?" he questioned. "'Rill Scattergood's resigned and the school committee is lookin' for a new teacher. That feller's got the bee in his bonnet, they told me at Middletown."

"The school-teaching bee?" laughed the girl.

"Yep. He'd been for his certif'cate. He's been writin' to the Poketown committee."

"But—but he isn't much more than a boy himself, is he?"

"They tell me he's been through college. Must be a smart youngster for, as you say, he's nothin' but a kid."

"I didn't say that!" cried Janice, in some little panic, for she knew Dexter's proneness to gossip. "Don't you dare say I did!"

He chuckled. "Wa-al, ye meant it. Come now—didn't ye? An' he is a mighty young feller ter be teachin' school. 'Specially with sech big girls an' boys in it. He'll have ter fight the boys, it's likely, an' I shouldn't wonder if the big gals set their caps for him."

"I'm afraid you're a very reckless talker, Mr. Dexter," sighed Janice. Then her hazel eyes brightened suddenly, and she added, "They ought to call you 'Talky' Dexter, instead of 'Walky', I believe."

"'Talkworthy Dexter', eh?" he grinned.

"I'm not sure that you do always talk worthy," she told him, shaking a serious head. "You're very apt to say things to 'stir folks all up,' as my Aunt says. Oh, yes, you do! You know you do, Mr. Dexter."

"Wal, I declare!" chuckled the man, but with a queer little side glance at the serious face of the girl. "Think I'm a trouble-breeder, do ye?"

"You just ask yourself that, sir," said Janice, firmly. "You know you're just delighted if you can say something to 'start things going,' as you call it. And it isn't worthy of you——"

"Whether I'm 'Talkworthy', or 'Walkworthy', eh?" he broke in, laughing.

"Oh, I didn't mean any offence!" exclaimed Janice, much disturbed now to think that she had criticised the man just as he was in the habit of criticising everybody else.

"I snum! mebbe you're right," grunted Walky Dexter. "And I reckon talkin' don't do much good after all. Now, look at Cross Moore. I been at him a year an' more to fix that rail fence along the ditch by his house. 'Tain't done no good. But, by jinks! somebody else got at him," added Walky, slyly, "an' I see this mornin' Cross was gittin' the rails and new posts there. He was right on the job."

Janice's cheeks grew rosy. "Why!" she cried, "I never said a word to him about it."

"No; but somehow he got the idee from you. He told me so," and Walky chuckled.

"I think Mr. Moore likes to joke—the same as you do, Mr. Dexter," said Janice, quietly.

"Ahem! You sartainly have got some of us goin'," said the driver, whimsically. "Look at Jase Day! I never did think nothin' less'n Gabriel's trump would start Jase. But yest'day I'm jiggered if I didn't see him mendin' his pasture fence. And the old Day house looks like another place—that's right. How d'you do it?"

"I—I don't just know what you mean," stammered Janice, feeling very uncomfortable.

He looked at her with his eyes screwed up again. "D'you know what they said about yer uncle las' year? He come down to Jefferson's store with a basket of pertaters. All the big ones was on top and the little ones at the bottom. Huh! He ain't the only one that 'deacons' a basket of pertaters," and Walky chuckled.

"But the boys said 'twas easy to see how come Jase's pertaters that-a way. 'Twas 'cause it took him so 'tarnal long to dig a basket, that the pertaters grew ahead of him in the row—that's right! When he begun they was little, but by the time he got a basket full they'd growed a lot," and the gossip guffawed his delight at the story.

"But he's sure gettin' 'round some spryer this year. An' I snum! there's Marty, too. He's workin' in his mother's garden reg'lar. I seen him. 'Fore you came, Miss Janice, if Marty was diggin' in the garden an' found a worm, he thought he was goin' fishin' and got him a bait can and a pole, an' set right off for the lake—that's right!" and Walky shook all over, and grew so red in the face over his joke that Janice was really afraid he was becoming apoplectic.

But something in the middle of the road, as they made another corner, stopped all this fun.

"Hullo!" exclaimed Walky. "That young feller on the gasoline bike has had an accident. Don't it look that way to you?"

CHAPTER XIII

NELSON HALEY

The team drew to a halt without any command, and directly beside the young man, who was working diligently over the overturned motorcycle. His repair kit was spread out at the roadside, and the cause of the trouble was self-evident, it would seem. But Walky was a true Yankee and had to ask questions.

"Had a puncture, Mister?" he drawled, as the young man looked up, saw Janice on the seat beside the driver, and flushed a little.

"Oh, no!" returned the victim of the accident, with some asperity. "I'm just changing the air in these tires. The other air was worn out, you know."

For a moment Walky's eyes bulged, and Janice giggled loudly. Then Mr. Dexter saw the point of the joke. He slapped his leg and laughed uproariously.

"You'll do! By jinks! you surely will do," he declared. "I reckon you air smart enough, young feller, ter teach the Poketown school. An' that's what they say you're in these parts for?"

"I am here to see the school committee about the position," said the young fellow. "Are you one of the committee?"

"Me? No—I should say not!" gasped Walky. "Old Bill Jones, an' 'Squire Abe Connett, and Elder Concannon air the committee."

"Oh!" returned the youth, quite coolly. "I didn't know but you were one of the number, and that I was already being put through my examination."

But Walky Dexter was not easily feazed. He just blinked twice over this snub and pursued the conversation:

"They tell me you've been ter college?"

"My! my!" exclaimed the young man, "they tell you a good deal, don't they? Is it just a habit folks have, or have the Poketown selectmen passed an ordinance that you are to be the recipient of all personal information?"

Janice was still amused, although she thought the young man was rather hard upon the town gossip. But Walky thought the observation over, and seemed finally to realize that the motorcyclist was making sport of him.

"Aw, well," he said, grinning broadly, "if you air tender about your pussonal record, I'll say no more about it. But I allus b'lieve in goin' right ter headquarters when I want ter know anything. Saves makin' mistakes. If you air ashamed of your criminal past, Mister, why, that's all right—we won't say no more about it."

At this the young fellow stood up, put his hands upon his hips, and burst into a hearty shout of laughter. Janice had to join in, while Walky Dexter grinned, knowing he had made a good point.

"You certainly had me there, old timer!" declared the youth at last. "Now providing you will be as frank, and do the honors as well, I'll introduce myself as Nelson Haley. I hail from Springfield. I have spent four years in the scholastic halls of Williamstown. I hope to go to law school, but meanwhile must earn a part of the where-with-all. Therefore, I am attacking the citadel of the Poketown School."

"Oh! That's the why-for of it, eh?" crowed Walky. "Much obleeged. I'll know what to say now when anybody asks me."

"I hope so," returned Nelson Haley, with some sarcasm. "But fair exchange, Mister. You might tell me who I have the honor of speaking to—and, especially, you might introduce me to the lady?"

"Oh! Eh?" and Walky looked at the blushing Janice, questioningly. The girl smiled, however, and the driver cleared his throat and gravely made the introduction. "And I'm Walky Dexter," he concluded. "If you git the Poketown school you'll come ter know me quite well, I shouldn't wonder."

"That is something to look forward to, I am sure," declared Nelson Haley, drily. Then he turned to Janice, and asked:

"Will you be one of my pupils, if I have the good fortune to get the school, Miss Day?"

"I—I am afraid not. I do not really belong in Poketown," Janice explained. "And the ungraded school could not aid me much."

"No, I suppose not," returned the young man. "Well! I hope I see you again, Miss Day."

Walky clucked to the horses and they jogged on, leaving Nelson Haley to finish his repairs. Walky chuckled, and said to Janice:

"He's quite a flip young feller. He is young to tackle the Poketown school. An' 'twill be an objection, I shouldn't wonder. Ye see, they couldn't find that fault with 'Rill Scattergood."

"But I venture to say that they did when she first came to Poketown to teach," cried Janice.

"Oh, say! I sh'd say they did," agreed Walky, with a retrospective rolling of his head. "An' she was a purty young gal, then, too. There was more on us than Hopewell Drugg arter 'Rill in them days—yes, sir-ree!"

Janice was curious, and she yielded to the temptation of asking the town gossip a question:

"Why—why didn't Miss 'Rill marry Hopewell, then?"

"The goodness only knows why they fell out, Miss Janice," declared Walky. "We none of us ever made out. I 'spect it was the old woman done it—ol' Miz' Scattergood. She didn't take kindly to Hopewell. And then—Well, 'Cinda Stone was lef' all alone, an' she lived right back o' Drugg's store, an' her father had owed Drugg a power of money 'fore he died—a big store bill, ye see. Hopewell Drugg is as soft as butter; mebbe he loved 'Cinda Stone; anyhow he merried her after he'd got the mitten from Amarilla. Huh! ye can't never tell the whys and wherefores of sech things—not re'lly."

A presidential election would have made little more stir in Poketown than the coming there of this young man who looked for the position of school-teacher. Marty brought home word at night to the old Day house that Mr. Haley had put up at the Lake View Inn; that he had let two of the older boys try out his motorcycle; that he could pitch a ball that "Dunk" Peters couldn't hit, even though "Dunk" had played one season with the Fitchburg team. Likewise, that Mr. Haley was to go before the school committee that evening. And after supper Marty hastened down town again to learn how the examination of the young collegian "came out."

"I do hope," sighed Aunt 'Mira, "that this young man gits the school. Mebbe Marty will like him, an' go again. I won't say but that the boy's a good deal better'n he was; he's changed since you've come, Janice. But he'd oughter git more schoolin'—so he had."

"I met Mr. Haley," said her niece, quietly. "He seems like quite a nice young man; and, if he has any interest in his work, he ought to give a good many of the Poketown boys a better start."

For Marty Day was not the only young loafer in the town. There was always a group of half-grown boys hanging about Josiah Pringle's harness shop, or the sheds of the Lake View Inn.

In Greensboro there had been a good library and reading-room, and the Young Men's Christian Association boys and young men had a chance there. Janice knew that her father's influence had helped open these club-like places for the boys, and so had kept them off the streets. There wasn't a thing in Poketown for boys to do or a place to go to, save the stores where the older men lounged. Sometimes, her aunt told her, men brought jugs of hard cider to the Inn tables, and the boys got to drinking the stuff.

"Now, if this Nelson Haley is any sort of a fellow, and he gets the school," murmured Janice to herself, "he may do something."

Marty brought home the latest report from the committee meeting before they went to bed. Mr. Haley seemed to have made a good impression upon the three old dry-as-dust committeemen, especially on old Elder Concannon, the superannuated minister who had lived in Poketown for fifty years, although he had not preached at the Union Church, saving on special occasion, for two decades.

"The Elder says he thinks this Haley'll do," said Marty, with a grin. "I heard him tell Walky Dexter so. He knows some Latin, Haley does," added the boy. "What's Latin, Janice?"

"Nothing that will help him in the least to teach the Poketown School," declared his cousin, rather sharply for her. "Isn't that ridiculous! What can that old minister be thinking of?"

"The Elder's great on what he calls 'the classics,'" said Mr. Day, with a chuckle. "He reads the Bible in the 'riginal, as he calls it. He allus said 'Rill Scattergood didn't know enough to teach school."

"I don't believe that Poketown really needs a teacher who reads Hebrew and can translate a Latin verse. That is, those studies will not help Mr. Haley much in your school," Janice replied.

"Wal," said Marty, "I'll go when school opens and give him a whirl. Maybe he'll teach me how to fling that drop curve."

"Now!" whined Aunt 'Mira, when Marty had stumped up to bed. "What good is it goin' ter do that boy ter go ter school an' learn baseball, I want ter know?"

CHAPTER XIV

A TIME OF TRIAL

Janice met Nelson Haley a couple of days later in Hopewell Drugg's store. The matter had been decided ere then; Haley had obtained the school and had quickly established himself in a boarding-place, as the school would open the next week.

'Rill Scattergood and her mother had already gone to housekeeping in three nice rooms just around the corner on High Street, and Mr. Haley had the good fortune to be "taken in" by Mrs. Beasely. The gaunt old widow was plainly delighted once more to have "a man to do for."

"If my digestion holds out, Miss Day," whispered the young man to Janice, "I'm going to do fine with Mrs. Beasely. Good old creature! But she may kill me with kindness. I don't see how I am going to be able to do full justice to her three meals a day."

"I hope you will like it as well in school as you do at your boarding-place," ventured Janice, timidly.

"Oh, the school? That's going to be pie," laughed Haley. "You know about how it's been run, don't you?"

"I—I attended for more than a month last spring," admitted the girl.

"Then you know very well," said the young man, smiling broadly, "that it won't be half a trick to satisfy the committee. They don't expect much. 'Just let things run along easy-like'; that will please them. If I can keep the boys straight and teach the youngsters a little, that will be about all the committee expects. Elder Concannon admitted that much to me. You see, the whole committee are opposed to what they term 'new-fangled notions.'"

"But there is some sentiment in town for an improvement in the school," declared Janice. "Don't you know that? Many people would like to see the children taught more, and the school more up-to-date."

"Oh, well," and Haley laughed and shrugged his shoulders. "The committee seem to be in power, and—Well, Miss Day, you can be sure that I know which side my bread is buttered on," he concluded, lightly.

Janice liked this bright, laughing young man very much. But she was sorry he had no more serious interest in his position than this conversation showed.

Then there suddenly came a time when Janice Day's own interest in Poketown and Poketown people—in everything and everybody about her—seriously waned. Daddy had not written for a fortnight. When the letter finally came it had been delayed, and was not postmarked as usual. Daddy only hinted at one of the belligerent armies being nearer to the mines, and that most of his men had deserted.

There was trouble—serious trouble, or Daddy would not have kept his daughter in suspense. Janice watched the mails, eagle-eyed. She wrote letter after letter herself, begging him to keep her informed,—begging him to come away from that hateful Mexico altogether.

"Broxton's no business to be 'way down there at all," growled Uncle Jason, who was worried, too, and hadn't the tact to keep his feelings secret from the girl. "Why, Walky Dexter tells me they are shootin' white folks down there jest like we'd shoot squirrels in these parts."

"Oh, Jason!" gasped Aunt 'Mira. "It can't be as bad as that!"

"Wuss. They jest shot a rancher who was a Britisher, an' they say there'll be war about it. I dunno. Does look as though our Government ought ter do somethin' to protect Americans as well as Britishers. But, hi tunket! Broxton hadn't ought ter gone down there—no, sir-ree!"

This sort of talk did not help Janice. She drooped about the house and often crept off by herself into the woods and fields and brooded over Daddy's peril. School had begun, and Marty went with several of the bigger boys that had hung around Pringle's harness shop and the Inn stables.

"That Nelse Haley is all right," the boy confided to his cousin. "We're going to have two baseball teams next year. He says so. Then we kin have matched games. But now he's goin' to send for what he calls a 'pigskin' and he's a-goin' to teach us football. Guess you've heard of that, eh?"

"Oh, yes," said Janice. "It's a great game, Marty. But what about school? Is he teaching you anything?"

Marty grinned. "Enough, I guess. Things goin' along easy-like. He don't kill us with work, that's one thing. Old Elder Concannon's been up once and sat an' listened to the classes. He seems satisfied."

Janice did not lose sight of Hopewell Drugg and little Lottie. The store was now doing a fairly good business; but the man admitted that the profits rolled up but slowly, and it would be a long time before he could take his little daughter to Boston.

These fall days Janice was frequently with Miss 'Rill. The little maiden lady seemed to understand better than most people just how Janice was troubled by her father's absence, his silence, and his peril. Besides, when old Mrs. Scattergood did not know, many were the times that 'Rill and Janice went to Hopewell Drugg's and "tidied up" the cottage for him. 'Rill would not go without Janice, and they usually stole in by the side door without saying a word to the storekeeper. He was grateful for their aid, and little Lottie was benefited by their ministrations.

Then another letter came from Broxton Day. He admitted that the two armies were very near—one between him and communication with his friends over the Rio Grande—and that operations at the mine had completely ceased. Yet he felt it his duty to remain, even though the property was "between two fires," as it were.

Ere this Janice had sent off for an up-to-date map of northern Mexico and the Texan border. She and Marty and Mr. Day had pored over it evenings and had now marked the very spot in the hills where the mine was located. The girl subscribed for a New York newspaper, too, and that came in the evening mail. So they followed the movements of the Federal and the Constitutionalist armies as closely as possible from the news reports, and Janice read about each battle with deeper and deeper anxiety.

Had her uncle and aunt been wise they would have interfered in this occupation, or at least, they would not have encouraged it. Janice lost her cheerfulness and her rosy cheeks. Aunt 'Mira declared she drooped "like a sick chicken."

"Ye mustn't pay so much 'tention to them papers," she complained. "I never did think much o' N'York daily papers, nohow. They don't have 'nuff stories in 'em."

But it was her own money Janice spent for the papers. Whenever Daddy had written he had usually enclosed in his envelope a bank note of small denomination for Janice. The bank in Greensboro sent the board money regularly to Uncle Jason (and Aunt 'Mira got it for her own personal use, as she declared she would), but Janice always had a little in her pocket.

Had she been well supplied with cash about this time the girl would have been tempted to run away and take the train for Mexico herself. It did seem to her, when the weeks went by without a letter reaching her from her father, as though he must be wounded, and suffering, and needing her!

But she did not have sufficient money to pay her fare such a long distance.

Aunt 'Mira was a poor comforter. Yet she fortunately aided in giving Janice something else to think about just then. The girl had helped "spruce up" Aunt 'Mira long since, so that they could go to church together on Sundays. But now the good lady was in the throes of making herself a silk dress for best—a black silk. It was the thing she had longed for most, and now she could satisfy the craving for clothes that had so obsessed her.

Aunt 'Mira loved finery. Janice had to use her influence to the utmost to keep the good lady from committing the sin of getting this wonderful dress too "fancy." Left to herself, Mrs. Day would have loaded it with bead trimming and cut-steel ornaments. At first she even wanted it cut "minaret" fashion, which would have, in the end, made the poor lady look a good deal like an overgrown ballet dancer!

Janice had been glad to go to church. Always, before coming to Poketown, the girl had held a vital interest in church and church work. But here she found there was really nothing for the young people to do. They had no society, and aside from the Sunday School, a very cut-and-dried session usually, there was no special interest for the young.

Mr. Middler, the pastor, was a mild-voiced, softly stepping man, evidently fearing to give offense. Although he had been in the pastorate for several years, he seemed to have very little influence in the community. Elder Concannon and several other older members controlled the church and its policies utterly; and they frowned on any innovation.

One Sabbath, old Elder Concannon—a grizzled, heavy-eyebrowed man, with a beak-like nose and flashing black eyes—preached, and he thundered out the "Law" to his hearers as a man might use a goad on a refractory team of oxen. Mr. Middler was a faint echo of the old Elder on most occasions. He seemed afraid of taking his text from the New Testament. It was Law, not Love, that was preached at the Poketown Union Church; and although the dissertations may have been satisfactory to the older members, they did not attract the young people to service, or feed them when they did come!

Janice often wondered if the loud "Amens!" of Elder Concannon, down in the corner, were worth as much to poor little Mr. Middler as would have been a measure of vital interest shown in the church and its work by some of the young people of the community.

There was a Ladies Sewing Circle. There is always a Ladies Sewing Circle! But, somehow, the making up of barrels of cast-off clothing for unfortunate missionaries in the West, or up in Canada, or the sewing together of innumerable ill-cut garments, which must, of course, be "misfits" for the unknown infants for whom they were intended,—all this never could seem sufficient to "feed the spirit," to Janice Day's mind.

Once or twice she went with Aunt 'Mira (who was proud of her new clothes and would occasionally go about to show them, now) to the sewing society meeting. But there were few other young girls there, and the gossip was not seasoned to her taste.

One day came a letter from Daddy's friend and business associate in Juarez. For three weeks Janice had not received a word from her father. The man in Juarez wrote:

CHAPTER XV

NEW BEGINNINGS

The very worst of it was, there was nothing Janice could do! She must wait, and to contemplate that passive state, almost drove her mad!

Day after day passed without bringing any further news. She read the papers just as eagerly as before; but the center of military activity in Mexico had suddenly shifted to an entirely different part of the country. There was absolutely no news in the papers from the district where the mine was situated.

Mr. Buchanan wrote once again, but even more briefly. He was a busy man, and had done all that he could. If he heard from, or of, Mr. Day he would telegraph Janice at once, and if she heard she was to let him know by the same means.

That was the way the matter stood. It seemed as though the State Department could, or would, do nothing. Mr. Day, like other citizens of the United States, had been warned of the danger he was in while he remained in a country torn by civil strife. The consequences were upon his own head.

The folks who knew about Janice's trouble tried to be good to her. Walky Dexter drove around to invite the girl to go with him whenever he had a job that took him out of town with the spring wagon. Janice loved to jog over the hilly roads, and she saw a good bit of the country with Dexter.

"I'd love to own just a little automobile that I could run myself," she said once.

"Why don't you borry Nelse Haley's gasoline bike?" demanded Walky, with a grin. "Or, mebbe he'll put a back-saddle on fer yer. I've seen 'em ride double at Middletown."

"I don't like motorcycles. I want a wide seat and more comfort," said Janice. "Daddy said that, perhaps, if things went well with him down there in Mexico, I could have an auto runabout," and she sighed.

"Now, Miss Janice!" exclaimed the man, "don't you take on none. Mr. Broxton Day'll come out all right. I remember him as a boy, and he was jest as much diff'rent from Jason as chalk is from cheese! Yes, sir-ree!"

This implied a compliment for her father, Janice knew, so she was pleased. Walky Dexter meant well.

Little Miss Scattergood was Janice's greatest comfort during this time of trial. She did not discuss the girl's trouble, but she showed her sympathy in other ways. Old Mrs. Scattergood always wanted to discuss the horrors of the Mexican War, whenever she caught sight of Janice, which was not pleasant. So Miss 'Rill and Janice arranged to meet more often at Hopewell Drugg's, and little Lottie received better care those days than ever before.

Miss 'Rill was not a bad seamstress, and the two friends began to make Lottie little frocks; and, as Hopewell only had to supply the material out of the store, Lottie was more prettily dressed—and for less money—than previously.

As Janice and the ex-schoolmistress sat sewing in the big Drugg kitchen, Hopewell would often linger in the shed room with his violin, when there were no customers, and play the few pieces he had, in all these years, managed to "pick out" upon his father's old instrument. "Silver Threads Among the Gold" was the favorite—especially with Lottie. She would dance and clap her hands when she felt the vibration of certain minor chords, and come running to the visitors and attract their attention to the sounds that she could "hear."

"He-a! he-a! he-a!" she shouted in that shrill toneless voice of hers.

Janice noticed that she talked less than formerly. Gradually the power of speech was going from her because of disuse. It is almost always so with the very young who are deprived of hearing.

Such a pitiful, pitiful case! Sometimes Janice could not think of little Lottie without weeping. It seemed so awful that merely a matter of money—a few hundred dollars—should keep this child from obtaining the surgical help and the training that might aid her to become a happy, normal girl.

It was from Mr. Middler—rather, through a certain conversation with the minister—that Janice received the greatest help during these weeks when her father's fate remained uncertain.

She could not spend all her time at Hopewell Drugg's, or with Walky Dexter, or even about the old Day house. Autumn had come, and the mornings were frosty. The woods were aflame with the sapless leaves. Ice skimmed the quiet pools before the late-rising sun kissed them.

Janice had sometimes met the minister when she tramped over the hillside—and especially up toward the Shower Bath in Jason Day's wood lot. One glowing, warm October afternoon the girl and the gentle little parson met on the cow path through Mr. Day's upper pasture.

"Ah, my dear!" he said, shaking hands. "Where are you bound for?"

"I don't know whether I had better tell you, or not, sir," she returned, smiling, yet with some gravity. "You see, I was going to get comfort."

"Comfort?"

"Yes, sir. You see, sometimes I get to thinking of—of Daddy so much that the whole world seems just made up of my trouble!" said Janice, with a sob. "Do you know what I mean, sir? Just as though me and my troubles were the most important things in existence—the only things, in fact."

"Ah—yes. I see—I see," whispered Mr. Middler, patting her shoulder, but looking away from her tear-streaked face. "We are all that way—sometimes, Janice. All that way."

"And then I go somewhere to get out of myself,—to—to get comfort."

"I see."

"And so I am going now to the place I call The Overlook. It's a great rock up yonder. I scramble up on top of it, and from that place I can see so much of the world that, by and by, I begin to realize just how small I really am, and how small, in comparison, my troubles must be in the whole great scheme of things. I begin to understand, then," she added, softly, "that God has so much to 'tend to in the Universe that He can't give me first chance always. I've got to wait my turn."

"Oh, but my dear!" murmured the doctrinarian. "I wouldn't limit the power of the Almighty—even in my thoughts."

"No-o. But—but God does just seem more human and close to me if I think of Him as very busy—yet thoughtful and kind for us all. Just—just like my Daddy, only on a bigger scale, Mr. Middler."

The minister looked at her gravely for a moment and then took her hand again. "Suppose you show me that place of comfort?" he suggested, quietly.

They went on together through the pasture and up into the wood lot. They came out upon an unexpected opening in the wood, at the beginning of a great gash in the hillside. At the center of this opening was a huge boulder, surrounded by hazelnut bushes, to which the brown leaves still clung.

"You can climb up easily from the back. Let me show you," said Janice, who had by now got control of her tears, and was more like her smiling, cheerful self.

She ran up the incline, sure-footed as a goat; but at the more difficult place she gave the minister her hand. He was much more breathless than she when they stood together upon the overhanging rock.

Below them was the steep, wooded hillside, and the broken pastures and scattered houses north of Poketown, along the shore of the lake. This spot was on the promontory that flanked the bay upon one side. From this point it seemed that all of the great lake, with both its near and distant shores, lay spread at their feet!

In the northwest frowned the half-ruined fortress, so heroic a landmark of pre-Revolutionary times. Nearer lay the wooded, rocky isle where a celebrated Indian chief had made his last stand against the encroaching whites. Yonder was the spot where certain of those bold pioneers and fighters, the Green Mountain Boys, embarked under their famous leaders, Allen and Warner, upon an expedition that historians will never cease to write of.

It was a noble, as well as a beautiful, view. God's world did look bigger and greater from The Overlook. Sitting by her side, the minister held the girl's hand, and listened to her artless expressions. She told him quite frankly what all this view meant to her,—how it helped and soothed her worried spirit, brought comfort to her grieving heart. Here were many square miles of God's Footstool under her gaze; and there were many, many thousands of other spots like this between her and the Mexican mountains in which her father was held a prisoner. And God had the same care over one bit of landscape as he did over another!

"Then," she said, softly, in conclusion, "then I just seem to grasp the idea of God's bigness—and how much He has to do. I won't complain. I'll wait. And meanwhile I'll do, if I can, what Daddy told me to."

"What is that, Janice?" asked the minister, still gazing out over the vast outlook himself.

"I must do something,—keep to work, you know. Try and make things better. You know: 'Each in his small corner.' And there's so much to be done in Poketown!"

"So much—in Poketown?" ejaculated the minister, suddenly brought out of his reverie.

"Yes, sir."

"But I thought Poketown was a particularly satisfactory place. There really is very little to do here. We have a very clean political government, remarkably so. Of course, that fact would not so much interest you, Janice. But the life of the church is very spiritual—very. We have no saloons; we seldom have an arrest——"

"Oh, I never thought of those things," admitted Janice. "There isn't really anything for young people to do in the Poketown Church, I know. But outside——"

"And what can be done outside?" asked the minister, and perhaps he winced a little at the confidence in Janice's voice when she spoke of the church system which kept the young people at a distance.

"Why, you know, there are the boys. Boys like Marty—my cousin. He goes to school now, it's true; but he's down town just as much as ever at night. And there's no good place for the boys to go—to congregate, I mean."

"Humph! I thought once of opening the church basement to them," murmured Mr. Middler. "But—but there was opposition. Some thought the boys might take advantage of our good nature and be ill-behaved."

"So they continue to hang around the hotel sheds and the stores," pursued Janice, thoughtfully, without meaning to be critical. "Boys will get together in a club, or gang. Daddy used to say they were naturally gregarious, like some birds."

"Yes," said the minister, slowly.

"They ought to have a nice, warm, well-lighted room where they could go, and play games, and read,—with a circulating library attached. Of course, a gymnasium would be too much to even dream of, at first! Why! wouldn't that be fine? And isn't it practical? Do say it is!"

"I do not know whether it is practicable or not, Janice," said the minister, slowly, yet smiling at her. "But the thought is inspired. You shall have all the help I can give you. It ought to be in the church——"

"No. That would scare the boys away," interposed Janice, with finality.

"Why, my dear? You speak as though the church was a bogey!"

"Well—but—dear Mr. Middler! Just ask the boys themselves. How many of them love to go to church—even to Sunday School? I mean the boys that hang about the village stores at night."

"It is so—it is so," he admitted, with a sigh.

From this sprang the idea of the Poketown Free Library. It was of slow growth, and there is much more to be said about it; but Janice found her personal troubles much easier to bear when she began trying to interest the people of Poketown in the reading-room idea.

And didn't Mr. Middler bear something of his own away from that visit to The Overlook—something that glowed in his heart? He preached quite a different kind of a sermon that next Sunday, and the text was one of the most helpful and living in all the New Testament.

Some of the older members of his congregation shook their heads over it. It was not "strong meat," they said; there was nothing to argue about! But a dozen troubled, needy members who heard the sermon, felt new hope in their hearts, and they got through the following week—trials and all!—much easier than usual.

CHAPTER XVI

The girl had studied Marty, if she had had little opportunity of becoming acquainted with other specimens of the genus boy. She knew they were as bridle-shy as wild colts.

The idea of the club-room for reading and games must seem to come from the boys themselves. It must appear that they accepted adult aid perforce, but with the distinct understanding that the room was theirs and that there was not to be too much oversight or control by the supporting members of the institution.

The scheme was not at all original with Janice. The nucleus of many a successful free library and village club has been a similar idea.

"Marty, why don't you and your chums have a place of your own where you can read and play checkers these cold nights? I hear Josiah Pringle has chased you out of his shop again."

"Ya-as—mean old hunks!"

"But didn't somebody spoil a whole nest of whips for him by pouring liquid glue over the snappers?"

"Well! that was only one feller. An' Pringle put us all out," complained the boy, but grinning, too.

"You wouldn't have let that boy do such a thing in your own club-room—now, would you?"

"Huh! how'd we ever git a club-room, Janice? We had Poley Haskin's father's barn one't; but when we tried to heat it with a three-legged cookstove, Poley's old man put us out in a hurry."

"Oh, I mean a real nice place," said the wily Janice. "Not a place to smoke those nasty cigarettes in, and carry on; but a real reading-room, with books, and papers, and games, and all that."

"Oh, that would be fine! But where'd we get that kind of a place in Poketown?" queried Marty.

That was the start of it.

There was an empty store on High Street next to the drug store. It was a big room which could be easily heated by a pot stove and a few lengths of stovepipe. It was owned by the drug-store man, and had been empty a long time. He asked six dollars a month rent for it.

It was just about this time that Janice learned she possessed powers of persuasive eloquence. The druggist was the first person she "tackled" in her campaign.

"It's a secret, Mr. Massey," she told him; "but some of the boys want a reading-room, and some of the rest of us are anxious to help them get it. Only it mustn't be talked of at first, or it will be all spoiled. You know how 'fraid boys are that there is going to be a trap set for them."

"Ain't that so?" chuckled the druggist.

"And we want your empty room next door."

"Wa-al—I dunno!" returned the man, finding the matter suddenly serious, when it was brought so close home to him.

"Of course, we expect to pay for it. Only we'd like to have you cut the rent in two for the first three months," said Janice, quickly.

"Say! that might be all right," the druggist observed, more briskly. "But I don't know about all these harum-scarums collecting around this corner. I have been glad heretofore that they have hung around Pringle's, or Joe Henderson's, or the hotel, instead of up here. They've been up to all sorts of mischief."

"If they don't behave reasonably they'll lose the reading-room. Of course that will be understood," said Janice.

"You can't trust some of 'em," growled the druggist. "Never!"

"We'll make those who want the reading-room make the mischievous ones behave," laughed Janice.

"Well," agreed the druggist, "we'll try it. Three dollars a month for three months; then six dollars. I can afford no more."

"So much for so much!" whispered Janice, when she came away from the store. "At least, it's a beginning."

But it was a very small beginning, as she soon began to realize. She had no money to give toward the project herself, and it was very hard to beg from some people, even for a good cause.

There was needed at least one long table and two small ones, as well as some sort of a desk for whoever had charge of the room; and shelves for the books, and lamps, and a stove, and chairs, beside curtains at the windows. These simple furnishings would do to begin with. But how to get any, or all, of these was the problem.

Janice went to several people able to help in the project, before she said anything more to Marty. Some of these people encouraged her; some shook their heads pessimistically over the idea.

She wished Elder Concannon to agree to pay the rent of the room for the first three months. It would be but nine dollars, and the old gentleman could easily do it. Since closing his pastorate of the Union Church, years before, Mr. Concannon had become (for Poketown) a rich man. He had invested a small legacy received about that time in abandoned marble quarries and sugar-maple orchards. Both quarries and orchards had taken on a new lease of life, and had enriched the shrewd old minister.

But Elder Concannon let go of a dollar no more easily now than when he had been dependent upon a four-hundred-dollar salary and a donation party twice a year.

It was not altogether parsimony that made the old gentleman "hem and haw" over Janice Day's proposal. Naturally, an innovation of any kind would have made him shy, but especially one calculated to yield any pleasure to the boys of Poketown.

"I don't dispute but you may mean all right, Miss Day," he said, shaking his bristling head at her. "But there's no good in those young scamps—no good at all. You would waste your time trying to benefit them. They would turn your reading-room into a bear garden."

"You do not know that, sir," said Janice, boldly. "Let us try them."

"You are very young, Miss Day," said the Elder, stiffly. "You should yield more easily to the opinions of your elders."

"Why?" demanded the girl, quickly, but smiling. "We young ones have got to learn through our own experiences, haven't we? When you were young, sir, you had to learn at first hand—isn't that so? You would not accept the opinions of the older men as infallible. Now, did you, sir?"

The Elder was a bit staggered; but he was honest.

"Ahem!" he said. "For that very reason I desire to have you accept my advice, young lady. It will save you much trouble and heartache. These boys need a stronger hand than yours——"

"Oh, my goodness!" gasped Janice. "I wouldn't undertake to have anything to do with governing them—no, indeed! I thought of speaking to Mr. Haley—if I could interest him in the project—and get him to keep an eye on the reading-room at night. But the boys will have to understand that they can only have the benefits of the place as long as they are on their good behavior."

"Ahem!" coughed the Elder again. "Mr. Haley is a very bright young man—an especially good Latin scholar. But I fancy he finds the boys quite enough to handle during the daytime, without having the care of them at night. And—to be frank—I do not approve of the idea at all."

"Then—then you positively will not help us?" asked Janice, disappointedly.

"You have not proved your case—to my mind—Miss Day," said the old gentleman, sternly. "It is not a feasible plan that you suggest. The young rascals would make the place a regular nuisance. They would be worse than they already are—and that is saying a good deal."

"I am sorry you think that, sir," returned Janice, quietly. "I think better of them than you do. I believe the boys will appreciate such a place and—if I can find enough people to help—I hope to see the reading-room established."

"I disapprove, Miss—I disapprove!" declared Elder Concannon, almost angrily, for he was not used to being crossed, especially in any semi-public matter like this. "You will find, too, that my opinion is the right one. Good-day, Miss. I am sorry to find one so young impervious to the advice of her elders."

"I'll just show him! That's what I'll do—I'll show him!" was the determination of the girl from Greensboro. "And I don't believe Poketown boys are much worse than any other boys—if they only have half a chance."

Fortunately all those to whom Janice went in her secret canvass were not like the opinionated old minister. Several subscribed money, and insisted upon paying their subscription over to her at once so that she might have a "working fund." Janice set aside three dollars for the first month's rent of the store and with the remainder purchased a second-hand table, some plain kitchen chairs, and some lumber. She began to use this subscribed money with some little trepidation, for—suppose her scheme fell through, after all?

She got her uncle to agree to the needed carpenter's work; a painter gave her a brush and sufficient wood-stain to freshen up all the woodwork of the store. Miss 'Rill came and helped her clean the place and kalsomine the walls and ceiling. A storekeeper gave her enough enameled oilcloth to cover neatly the long table. Hopewell Drugg furnished bracket lamps, and gave her the benefit of the wholesale discount on a hanging lamp and reflector to light the reading-table.

Walky Dexter did what carting was needed. Janice and her aunt made the curtains themselves, and they put them up so as to keep out the prying eyes of all Poketown, for the community now began to wonder what was going on in the empty room next the drug store. As Walky had been bound to secrecy, too, the curious had no means of learning what was going on. It was just as though the printing office of a thriving town newspaper had burned down and there was no means of disseminating the news. This was the effect of the muzzle on Walky Dexter!

It was at this point that Janice took Marty, and through him, the other boys, into the scheme.

"What would you boys each pay in dues to keep up a nice reading-room such as we talked about, Marty?" she asked her cousin.

"Aw, say!" grunted Marty. "Let's talk about the treasure chest we've found in our back yard. That sounds more sensible."

"Wouldn't you be glad of such a place?" laughed Janice.

"Say! would a duck swim?" growled the boy, thinking that she was teasing him. "Bring on your old reading-room, and we'll show ye."

That very afternoon she and Miss 'Rill had given the last touches to the room. It was as neat as a pin; the lamps were all filled and the chimneys polished. It was only a bare room, it was true; but there were possibilities in it, Janice was sure, that would appeal to Marty. She put on her hat and held her coat out for him to help her into.

"I'm going down town with you to-night, Marty," she said, smiling. "I've got something to show you."

"Huh! What's it all about?"

"You come along and see," she told him. "It's just the finest thing that ever happened—and you'll say so, too, I know."

But she refused to explain further until they turned up High Street and stopped at the dark and long-empty shop beside the drug store.

"Oh, gee! In Massey's store?" gasped Marty, when his cousin fitted a key to the lock.

"Come in and shut the door. Now stand right where you are while I light the lamp," commanded Janice.

She lit the hanging lamp over the table. The soft glow of it was soon flung down upon the dull brown cloth. Marty stared around with mouth agape.

His father had built a sort of counter at one end, with a desk and shelves behind it. Of course, there was not a book, or paper, in the place as yet—nor a game. But Marty needed no explanation.

"Janice Day! did you do all this?" he demanded, with a gasp.

"Of course not, goosey! Lots of people helped. And they're going to help more—if you boys show yourselves appreciative."

"What's that 'appreciative' mean?" demanded Marty, suspiciously.

"No fights here; no games that are so boisterous as to disturb those who want to read. Just gentlemanly behavior while you are in the room. That's all, besides a small tax each month to help toward the upkeep of the room. What do you say, Marty?"

"You done this!" declared the boy, with sudden heat. "Don't say you didn't, for that'll be a lie. I never saw a girl like you, Janice!"

"Why—why—Don't you like it?" queried Janice, disturbed.

"Of course I do! It's bully! It's great!" exclaimed Marty. "Lemme show it to the boys. They'll be crazy about it. And if they don't behave it'll be because they're too big for me to lick," concluded Marty, nodding his head emphatically.

Janice burst out laughing at this, and pressed the key into his hand. "Until we get organized properly, you will take charge of the room, won't you, Marty?"

"Sure I will."

"You'll need a stove; I think I can get that for you in a day or two. And lots of folks have promised books. I've written to friends in Greensboro for books, too. And several people who take magazines and papers regularly have promised to hand them over to the reading-room just as soon as they have read them. And you boys can bring your checkers, and dominoes, and other games, from home, eh?"

Marty was scarcely listening; but he was looking at her with more seriousness than his plain face usually betrayed.

"Janice, you're almost as good as a boy yourself!" he declared. "I'm not sorry a bit that you came to Poketown."

Janice only laughed at him again; yet the boy's awkward earnestness warmed her heart.

The girl was finding in these busy days the truest balm for her own worriments. Nothing more was heard of Mr. Broxton Day; yet Janice felt less need of running alone into the woods and fields to find that comfort about which she had told the minister.

Besides, it soon grew too cold for frequent jaunts afield. The small streams and pools were icebound. Then, over the fir-covered heights, sifted the first snow of winter, and Poketown seemed suddenly tucked under a coverlet of white.

The reading-room was an established fact. An association to support it was formed, divided into active and honorary members. The boys, as active members, themselves contributed twenty-five cents per month each, towards its support. Tables for games were set up. A goodly number of books appeared on the shelves. From Greensboro a huge packing-case of half-worn books was sent; Janice's friends at home had responded liberally.

Files of daily and weekly papers were established and magazines of the more popular kind were subscribed for. Nelson Haley gave several evenings each week to work as librarian, and to keep a general oversight of the boys. To tell the truth, he did this more because Janice asked him to than from personal interest in the institution; but he did it.

Slowly the more pessimistic of the townspeople began to show interest in the reading-room. Mr. Middler openly expressed his approval of the institution. Mr. Massey, the druggist, reported that the boys behaved themselves "beyond belief!"

At length, even old Elder Concannon appeared unexpectedly in the reading-room one night to see what was going on. He came to criticise and remained to play a game of "draughts," as he called them, with Marty Day himself!

"Them young scalawags, Elder," declared Massey, when the old gentleman dropped into the drug store afterward. "Them young scalawags are certainly surprising me. They behaved themselves more like human bein's than I ever knowed 'em to before. An' it's a nice, neat, warm room, too, ain't it, now?"

"Ahem! It appears to be," admitted Elder Concannon, and not so grudgingly as might have been expected. "But where's that young girl who had so much to do with it at first—where's that Day girl?"

"Why, pshaw, Elder! she don't have nothing to do with the reading-room," and the druggist's eyes twinkled. "Don't you know that she only starts things in this town? She sets folks up in the business of 'doing for themselves'. Then she goes along about her own business.

"What's that? Well, I dunno. I'm wonderin' myself just where she'll break out next!"