Part 22 (1/2)
Freddie had tried to give her just as they were stepping into the car.
”It's worth ony money to Mr. Freddie to have Mr. Peter s.n.a.t.c.h a bit of contentment from life--and Mr. Freddie is that prodigal with money that if you don't take it of him he'll hand it to the next one--”
”But I can't take money for playing--chess is only playing, its only for work we should take money.”
Janet snorted. She talked volubly in her rich broad Scotch. Agitated as she was, Felicia's own lips were mouthing these strange new sounds, she was sure she could get the gutteral A, she wasn't sure of the burry R. She couldn't heed at all what Janet was saying, indeed she couldn't listen intelligently, because her tired ears were still filled with the glorious harmonies of Dudley Hamilt's unfinished song.
When she shut her eyes she could see his tall figure swinging up the stairs--she was trying to convince herself that she was really glad that he hadn't recognized her, when the car stopped before her darkened house. Janet got out first, haughtily dismissing the chauffeur with the a.s.surance that she could walk the four blocks over to her own house and she'd not leave a clean car in such a dirty street as Montrose Place.
Dulcie was waiting on the old balcony. Bab.i.+.c.he trotted ahead of her when she opened the door, in ecstacy at Felicia's home coming. Dulcie set her flaring candle carefully on the newel post and eyed Janet.
”It's Janet MacGregor with me, Dulcie. She's a widow woman. This is Dulcie Dierckx, Janet, you'll like Dulcie--” She had Bab.i.+.c.he in her arms now, and was leaning wearily against the bal.u.s.trade, ”Janet was good to bring me home--I was a silly fool--I cried, Dulcie--”
Janet was peering curiously into the empty house.
”Is onybody livin' here?” she demanded. ”I thought I saw them all movin' out--I heard the building was comin' down to make room for lofts.”
Dulcie answered that it wasn't, holding the door open as a tactful hint that she'd better go. But Janet had no intention of leaving. She had a woman's curiosity about a vacant house, and she was frankly looking things over, craning her neck to glance down the murky hallway.
”Would you think the bas.e.m.e.nt might be to let to a decent body? It's no worth much, so old and all but I know a body as might conseeder it.” Impractical as the ”beastly step-aunt” had proclaimed her to be Dulcie grasped Janet's thin arm.
”How much would you pay?”
”Is it your hous'?”
”It's Miss Day's--” Dulcie nodded toward Felicia. ”She's just been thinking she might rent part of it. Of course its altogether too large for her.”
”If she's livin' here where's her furnis.h.i.+ngs?” demanded Janet cannily.
Felicia sat down on a stair. She motioned but the others remained standing, their lean figures casting grotesque shadows in the flickering light of the candle.
”This is the pattern of it,” the little seamstress explained. ”It's my house, Janet MacGregor, only it's dirty because while I was gone building my garden, some dirty filthy heathen came to live here. But now I'm home His Honor made them all go away. And as soon as I have earned enough money to pay the taxes and other things I shall make the house lovely again. The furniture is in a place called storage. I think I have to pay them something before I get my things, don't I, Dulcie?”
”What's the matter o' the storage bills?” demanded Janet her eyes gleaming.
Dulcie answered her, her sharp slangy syllables falling incisively after Felicia's low drawl.
”I don't know that it's any of your business but they amount to about two hundred dollars. I know what you're thinking, that with the furniture we could open a rooming house. I've been thinking that myself while Miss Day was gone. I've experience you know, my beastly step-aunt does make a good thing of it. So if you wanted to rent the bas.e.m.e.nt and had some furniture of your own Miss Day might consider it.”
Janet's thin arms rested akimbo. She nodded.
”If you've lodgings to let you've got to have some one to keep 'em tidy. There's a good bit o' money there for an able body. If the furnis.h.i.+ngs is what she ree-presents and you'd conseeder takin' me in on shares--I might conseeder--”
”Consider what?” gasped Dulcie.
”Conseeder advancing for the storage of the furnis.h.i.+ngs--with the furnis.h.i.+ngs as security o' course. And doin' some cleanin' toward the matter o' what ma rent would be. Mind I'm no sayin' I would until I see the furnis.h.i.+ngs. I'm on'y conseederin'--I'll have the matter o'
some ladders--” she peered again down the dark hallway, ”and I'd want a neat ticket in the window--”
At midnight, by the embers of their dying fire, Felicia lay with Dulcie's rug about her, plaintively pretending from the feel of the chair, that she was the young Felice of those long years ago, journeying toward the beloved House in the Woods. It was an easy pretense for she could glimpse the dark waters of the bay and the silent s.h.i.+ps drifting on the tide. A spring fog seeped through the open windows and she was quite as miserable as she had been on that memorable trip. Beside her in her own chair, Dulcie talked and talked, a thousand details that Felicia's tired wits could not follow. It did not seem at all a miracle to her that she had found Janet. She accepted her with the simplicity with which she accepted any one who came into her life.
”The garden is a little old pippin,” Dulcie boasted. ”We can make that all O. K. in a day or so, but the house did stump me! Janet MacGregor is an angel sent straight from heaven. If I ever get a commish' to sculpt an angel I shall use Janet MacGregor for my model, little Miss By-the-Day,” she sighed drowsily, ”your middle name must be Luck.”
”My middle name is Trenton,” answered Felicia literally. ”Dulcie, I am going to tell you something. Something you must remember. When our little garden is lovely again, if any one--ever--kisses--you out there and you love him--don't let any one take you away from him. Because it might be too long afterward that you come back--you might be old like Grandy and Piqueur--so that he wouldn't know you when he saw you. He wouldn't know that you were the--Girl,--”