Part 5 (2/2)

There was a distant tinkle of the store bell. Miss Frenzy, absorbed in her daily horror, did not hear this. ”Ugh! Ugh!” she was moaning. Again the long hand went out in a capturing gesture. ”There-there! I told you so; quant.i.ties more, _quant.i.ties_! Yet last night I was under the impression that I had disposed of the greater majority.”

Mrs. Tyarck's attention was diverted from the rose-worms and concentrated on the deserted shop. ”I heard the bell,” warned that accurate lady. Then, reprovingly: ”Don't you never have any one to keep store when you're out here? You'll lose custom, Frenzy. What's more, if you ain't careful, you'll lose stock. Ivy Corners ain't what it used to be; there's them Eastern peddlers that walks around as big as life, and speakin' English to fool everybody; and now, with the war and all, every other person you see is a German spy.”

As she spoke a large form appeared in the back doorway of Miss Frenzy's shop and a primly dressed woman entered the garden. She had a curiously large and blank face. She wore a mannishly made suit of slate-gray, wiry material, and her hat had two large pins of green which, inserted in front, glittered high on her forehead like bulbous, misplaced eyes. This lady carried a netted catch-all distended with many k.n.o.bby parcels and a bundle of tracts. As she saw the two in the garden she stretched her formless mouth over the white smile of recently installed porcelain, but the long reaches of her face had no radiance. The lady was, however, furnished with a curious catarrhal hawking which she used parenthetically, like comment. What she now had to say she prefaced with this juridic hawking.

”Well, there ain't no responsibility here, I see! Store door open, n.o.body around! Them two young ones of Smedge's lookin' in at the things, rubbin' their dirty hands all over the gla.s.s case, choosin' what's their favorite dry-goods! All I can say is, Frenzy, that either you trust yourself too much or you expect that Serapham and Cherab.u.m is going to keep store for you.”

Mrs. Tyarck turned as to a kindred spirit, remarking, with a contemptuous wink: ”Frenzy's rose-worms is on her mind. Seems she's overrun with 'em.”

Mrs. Cap.r.o.n, the newcomer, strode up the little path to the scene of action, but at the sharp exclamation of Miss Frenzy she halted.

”Have a care!” said the gaunt shopkeeper, authoritatively. She waved a bony hand in ceremonious warning. ”I should have warned you before,”

explained Miss Frenzy, ”but the impediment in your way is my cat-trap.

It would seem that I am systematically pestered with marauding cats. The annoyance continuing for some time, I am obliged to originate devices that curtail their penetrations.”

Mrs. Cap.r.o.n, indignantly whisking her skirt away from a strange-looking arrangement of corset steels and barrel staves connected by wires, strode into some deep gra.s.s, then gave vent to a majestic hawk of displeasure:

”What's this I got on my shoes? Fly-paper? For the land's sake! Now how in the name of Job do I get that off?”

Mrs. Tyarck, ingratiatingly perturbed, came to the rescue of her friend; the two wrestled with adhesive bits of paper, but certain fragments, affected by contact, fulfilled their utmost prerogative and were not detachable. When they were finally prevailed upon to leave the shoe of Mrs. Cap.r.o.n, they stuck with surprising pertinacity to the glove of her friend. The outcries of the two ladies were full of disgust and criticism.

”Well, Frenzy Giddings! You need a man in here! Some one to clean up after you. All this old paper 'n' stuff around! It's a wonder you don't get into it yourself, but then _you_ know where to step,” they said, grudgingly.

Miss Frenzy hardly heard them; she was still peering carefully under the leaves and around the many cl.u.s.ters of babyish rosebuds. ”Ah-ah!” she was still saying, shudderingly. Out went her hand with the same abhorrent gesture. ”After all my watchfulness! Another, and another!”

Mrs. Cap.r.o.n, indignant over this indifference to her fly-paper discomfort, now sought recognition of the damages she had sustained:

”I dun'no' will this plaguey stuff ever come off my mohair! Well, I'll never set foot in _here_ again! Say, Frenzy, I can send up one of my boys to-morrow and he'll clean up for you, fly-paper and all, for ten cents.”

For a moment Miss Frenzy hesitated. She stood tall and sheltering over the rose-bush, the little shawl thrown over her shoulders lifted in the breeze. She looked something like a gray moth: her arms long and thin like antennae, her spectacled eyes, gave her a moth's fateful look of flutter and blindness before light and scorching flame.

”You are most kind, but”-with a discouraged sigh-”it cannot be done.”

”It can't be done?” hawked Mrs. Cap.r.o.n.

Mrs. Tyarck turned a sharp look of disapproval around the little garden, saying in a low tone, ”It's reel sloven in here; she'd ought to do something for it.”

”Yes,” insisted Mrs. Cap.r.o.n, ”you want cleaning up in here; that's what.

That seedy gra.s.s! Them ragged vines! Your flowers overrun you-and that there fly-paper-”

Miss Frenzy sought to change the subject. With an air of obstinacy that sat curiously upon her, she directed the attention of her visitors to a young tree shooting up in green a.s.surance.

”My mystery,” she announced, with gentle archness. ”Not planted by human hands. Undoubtedly a seed dropped by a bird in flight. A fruit-tree, I suspect-possibly cherry, but whether wild or of the domestic species remains to be seen; only the fruit will solve the enigma.”

Mrs. Cap.r.o.n and Mrs. Tyarck regarded the little tree carelessly. ”Wild,”

they p.r.o.nounced as one woman, adding: ”Wild cherry. When it's big, it will dirty your yard something fearful.”

”I had a friend,” related Mrs. Tyarck. ”Her husband was a Mason. Seems she had a wild cherry-tree into her yard and she could never lay out a piece of light goods for bleachin' without fear of stains, and then the flies and the sparrers racketin' around all summer-why, it nearly druv her crazy!”

Miss Frenzy ignored these comments. ”My mystery,” she repeated, with reflecting eyes. ”The seed dropped by a bird in flight. Only the fruit will solve the enigma.” With an air of ceremonious explanation, Miss Giddings turned to the two visitors. ”I should acquaint you,” she remarked in soft courtesy, ”with the fact that, much as I regret the necessity of the fly-paper, it is, as you might say, _calculated_.”

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