Part 8 (1/2)

”Oh, if he'll only come back, it's all I'll ask!” returned Gran'ma Mullins sadly. ”To think he can't get there for four weeks yet. And think of Hiram in a boat! Why Hiram can't even see a mirror tipped back and forth without having to go right where he'll be the only company.

And then to be in a boat! A boat is such a tippy thing. I read about one man being drowned in one last week. They're hooking for him with dynamite to see if they can even get a piece of him back for his wife.

His wife isn't much like Lucy, I guess. Oh, Susan, you'll never know what I've stood from Lucy! n.o.body will.”

Miss Clegg shook her head and looked about her quarters with an eye that was dubious.

”I've got some eggs for supper,” said Gran'ma Mullins, ”one for you and one for me, and one for either of us as can eat two.”

”I can eat two,” said Susan, who thought best to declare herself at the outset.

”Is your things all out of the house?” Gran'ma Mullins asked, as they seated themselves at the table.

”Oh, yes,” answered Susan, ”everything is out! Towards the last we acted more like hens being fed than anything else, but we got everything finished.”

”Did you get the clock out safe?”

Susan's expression altered suddenly. ”The clock! Oh, the clock! What _do_ you think happened to that clock? And I didn't feel to mind it, either.”

”Oh, Susan, you didn't break it!”

”I did. And in sixty thousand flinders. And I'm glad, too. Very glad.

It's a sad thing as how we may be found out, no matter how careful we sweep up our trackings. And I don't mind telling you as the bitterest pill in my cup of clearing out has been that very same clock.”

”It was such a handsome clock,” said Gran'ma Mullins, opening her naturally open countenance still wider. ”Oh, Susan! What did happen?”

”You thought it was a handsome clock,” said Susan, ”and so did I. It was such a handsome clock that we weren't allowed to pick it up and look at it. Father screwed it down with big screws, so we couldn't, and he wet 'em so they rusted in. I had a awful time getting those screws out to-day, I can tell you. You get a very different light on a dead and gone father when you're trying to get out screws that he wet thirty-five years ago. Me on a stepladder digging under the claws of a clock for two mortal hours! And when I got the last one out, I had to climb down and wake my foot up before I could do the next thing. Then I got a block and a bed-slat, and I proceeded very carefully to try how heavy that handsome clock--that handsome marble clock--might be. I put the block beside it, and I put the bed-slat over the block and under the clock.

Then I climbed my ladder again, and then I bore down on the bed-slat.

Well, Gran'ma Mullins, you can believe me or not, just as you please, but it's a solemn fact that nothing but the ceiling stopped that clock from going sky-high. And nothing but the floor stopped me from falling through to China. I come down to earth with such a bang as brought Felicia Hemans running. And the stepladder shut up on me with such another bang as brought Sam Durny.”

”The saints preserve us!” e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Gran'ma Mullins.

”It wasn't a marble clock a _tall_,” confessed Susan. ”It was painted wood. That was why Father screwed it down. Oh, men are such deceivers!

And the best wife in the world can't develop 'em above their natural natures. I expect it was always a real pleasure to Father to think as Mother and me didn't know that marble clock was wood. I don't know what there is about a man as makes his everyday character liking to deceive and his Sunday sense of righteousness satisfied with just calling it fooling. Well, he's gone now, and the Bible says 'to him as hath shall be given,' so I guess he's settling up accounts somewheres. Give me the other egg!”

After supper they stepped over to Mrs. Macy's, which was next door, and the four sat on the piazza in the pleasant spring twilight. Mrs. Macy was so happy over having Mrs. Lathrop instead of Susan Clegg that she smiled perpetually. Mrs. Lathrop sat and rocked in her old-gold-plush rocker. Gran'ma Mullins and Susan Clegg occupied the step at the feet of the other two.

”Well, Susan,” Mrs. Macy remarked meditatively, ”I never looked to see you leave your house any way except feet first. Well, well, this certainly is a funny world.”

”Yes,” returned Susan, brief for once, ”it certainly is.”

”It's a very sad world, I think,” contributed Gran'ma Mullins with a heavy, heavy sigh. ”My goodness, to think this time last spring Hiram was spading up the potato patch! And now where is he?”

”n.o.body knows,” answered Susan. ”See how many years it was till Jathrop come back. But I do hope for your sake, Gran'ma Mullins, that when Hiram does come back he won't take it into his head to buy this house and build it over for you.”

Gran'ma Mullins looked at Mrs. Macy, and Mrs. Macy looked back at Gran'ma Mullins, and a message flashed and was answered in the glances.

”Well, Susan,” said Gran'ma Mullins with neighborly interest, ”you do see that the house needs fixing up, don't you?”

Susan was the owner and Mrs. Macy only the tenant, and the implication was not at all pleasing to her. She turned with the air of the weariest worm that had ever done so and gave Gran'ma Mullins a look that could only be translated as an admonition to mind her own business. Whereupon Gran'ma Mullins promptly subsided, and the subject did not come up again.

It was on a Monday--the very next Monday--that the workmen arrived and set to work to demolish the outer casing of the homes of Susan and Mrs.