Part 44 (1/2)
Mrs. Gilson encouraged him; Bill sat with almost closed eyes, glorying in the saga of small-town life; Saxton and Gilson did not conceal their contemptuous grins.
But Claire---- After nervously rubbing the tips of her thumbs with flickering agitated fingers, she had paid no attention to Bill and the revelation of Milt's rustic life; she had quietly gone to Milt, to help him prepare the scanty tea.
She whispered, ”Never mind, dear. I don't care. It was all twice as much fun as being wheeled in lacy prams by cranky nurses, as Jeff and I were.
But I know how you feel. Are you ashamed of having been a prairie pirate?”
”No, I'm not! We were wild kids--we raised a lot of Cain--but I'm glad we did.”
”So am I. I couldn't stand it if you were ashamed. Listen to me, and remember little Claire's words of wisdom. These fools are trying--oh, they're so obvious!--they're trying to make me feel that the prim Miss Boltwood of Brooklyn Heights is a stranger to you. Well, they're succeeding in making me a stranger--to them!”
”Claire! Dear! You don't mind Bill?”
”Yes. I do. And so do you. You've grown away from him.”
”I don't know but---- Today has been quite a test.”
”Yes. It has. Because if I can stand your friend Mr. McGolwey----”
”Then you do care!”
”Perhaps. And if I think that he's, oh, not much good, and I remember that for a long time you just had him to play with, then I'm all the more anxious to make it up to you.”
”Don't be sorry for me! I can't stand that! After all, it was a good town, and good folks----”
”No! No! I'm not sorry for you! I just mean, you couldn't have had so terribly much fun, after you were eighteen or so. Schoenstrom must have been a little dull, after very many years there. This stuff about the charm of backwoods villages--the people that write it seem to take jolly good care to stay in Long Island suburbs!”
”Claire!” He was whispering desperately, ”The tea's most done. Oh, my dear. I'm crazy with this puttering around, trying to woo you and having to woo the entire Gilson tribe. Let's run away!”
”No; first I'm going to convince them that you are--what I know you are.”
”But you can't.”
”Huh! You wait! I've thought of the most beautiful, beastly cruel plan for the reduction of social obesity----”
Then she was jauntily announcing, ”Tea, my dears. Jeff, you get the tooth-mug. Isn't this jolly!”
”Yes. Oh yes. Very jolly!” Jeff was thoroughly patronizing, but she didn't look offended. She made them drink the acid tea, and taste the chalk-like bread and b.u.t.ter sandwiches. She coaxed Bill to go on with his stories, and when the persistent Mrs. Gilson again asked the pariahs to come to dinner, Claire astonished Milt, and still more astonished Mrs. Gilson, by begging, ”Oh yes, please do come, Milt.”
He consented, savagely.
”But first,” Claire added to Mrs. Gilson, ”I want us to take the boys to---- Oh, I have the bulliest idea. Come, everybody. We're going riding.”
”Uh, where----?” hinted Mr. Gilson.
”That's my secret. Come!”
Claire pranced to the door, herded all of them down to the limousine, whispered an address to the chauffeur.
Milt didn't care much for that ride. Bill was somewhat too evidently not accustomed to limousines. He wiped his shoes, caked with red mud, upon the seat-cus.h.i.+ons, and apologized perspiringly. He said, ”Gee whillikens, that's a dandy idee, telephone to bawl the shuffer out with,” and ”Are them flowers real, the bokay in the vase?”
But the Gilsons and Jeff Saxton were happy about it all--till the car turned from a main thoroughfare upon a muddy street of shacks that clung like goats to the sides of a high cut, a street unchanged from the pioneer days of Seattle.