Part 9 (1/2)
”There's quite a good hotel,” said Dr. Hope, his eyes twinkling a little; ”I'll show it to you as we drive up. You'll find it very comfortable if you prefer to go there. But for these young people I've taken rooms at a boarding-house, a quieter and less expensive place. I thought it was what your father would prefer,” he added in a lower tone to Clover.
”I am sure he would,” she replied; but Mrs. Watson broke in,--
”Oh, I shall go wherever Miss Carr goes. She's under my care, you know--Though at the same time I must say that in the long run I have generally found that the most expensive places turn out the cheapest. As Ellen often says, get the best and--What do they charge at this hotel that you speak of, Dr. Hope?”
”The Shoshone House? About twenty-five dollars a week, I think, if you make a permanent arrangement.”
”That _is_ a good deal,” remarked Mrs. Watson, meditatively, while Clover hastened to say,--
”It is a great deal more than Phil and I can spend, Dr. Hope; I am glad you have chosen the other place for us.”
”I suppose it _is_ better,” admitted Mm Watson; but when they gained the top of the hill, and a picturesque, many-gabled, many-balconied structure was pointed out as the Shoshone, her regrets returned, and she began again to murmur that very often the most expensive places turned out the cheapest in the end, and that it stood to reason that they must be the best. Dr. Hope rather encouraged this view, and proposed that she should stop and look at some rooms; but no, she could not desert her young charges and would go on, though at the same time she must say that her opinion as an older person who had seen more of the world was--She was used to being consulted. Why, Addy Phillips wouldn't order that crushed strawberry bengaline of hers till Mrs. Watson saw the sample, and--But girls had their own ideas, and were bound to carry them out, Ellen always said so, and for her part she knew her duty and meant to do it!
Dr. Hope flashed one rapid, comical look at Clover. Western life sharpens the wits, if it does nothing else, and Westerners as a general thing become pretty good judges of character. It had not taken ten minutes for the keen-witted little doctor to fathom the peculiarities of Clover's ”chaperone,” and he would most willingly have planted her in the congenial soil of the Shoshone House, which would have provided a wider field for her restlessness and self-occupation, and many more people to listen to her narratives and sympathize with her complaints. But it was no use. She was resolved to abide by the fortunes of her ”young friends.”
While this discussion was proceeding, the carriage had been rolling down a wide street running along the edge of the plateau, opposite the mountain range. Pretty houses stood on either side in green, shaded door-yards, with roses and vine-hung piazzas and nicely-cut gra.s.s.
”Why, it looks like a New England town,” said Clover, amazed; ”I thought there were no trees here.”
”Yes, I know,” said Dr. Hope smiling. ”You came, like most Eastern people, prepared to find us sitting in the middle of a sandy waste, on cactus pincus.h.i.+ons, picking our teeth with bowie-knives, and with no neighbors but Indians and grizzly bears. Well; sixteen years ago we could have filled the bill pretty well. Then there was not a single house in St.
Helen's,--not even a tent, and not one of the trees that you see here had been planted. Now we have three railroads meeting at our depot, a population of nearly seven thousand, electric lights, telephones, a good opera-house, a system of works which brings first-rate spring water into the town from six miles away,--in short, pretty much all the modern conveniences.”
”But what _has_ made the place grow so fast?” asked Clover.
”If I may be allowed a professional pun, it is built up on coughings. It is a town for invalids. Half the people here came out for the benefit of their lungs.”
”Isn't that rather depressing?”
”It would be more so if most of them did not look so well that no one would suspect them of being ill. Here we are.”
Clover looked out eagerly. There was nothing picturesque about the house at whose gate the carriage had stopped. It was a large shabby structure, with a piazza above as well as below, and on these piazzas various people were sitting who looked unmistakably ill. The front of the house, however, commanded the fine mountain view.
”You see,” explained Dr. Hope, drawing Clover aside, ”boarding-places that are both comfortable and reasonable are rather scarce at St. Helen's. I know all about the table here and the drainage; and the view is desirable, and Mrs. Marsh, who keeps the house, is one of the best women we have.
She's from down your way too,--Barnstable, Ma.s.s., I think.”
Clover privately wondered how Barnstable, Ma.s.s., could be cla.s.sed as ”down” the same way with Burnet, not having learned as yet that to the soaring Western mind that insignificant fraction of the whole country known as ”the East,” means anywhere from Maine to Michigan, and that such trivial geographical differences as exist between the different sections seem scarcely worth consideration when compared with the vast s.p.a.ces which lie beyond toward the setting sun. But perhaps Dr. Hope was only trying to tease her, for he twinkled amusedly at her puzzled face as he went on,--
”I think you can make yourselves comfortable here. It was the best I could do. But your old lady would be much better suited at the Shoshone, and I wish she'd go there.”
Clover could not help laughing. ”I wish that people wouldn't persist in calling Mrs. Watson my old lady,” she thought.
Mrs. Marsh, a pleasant-looking person, came to meet them as they entered.
She showed Clover and Phil their rooms, which had been secured for them, and then carried Mrs. Watson off to look at another which she could have if she liked.
The rooms were on the third floor. A big front one for Phil, with a sunny south window and two others looking towards the west and the mountains, and, opening from it, a smaller room for Clover.
”Your brother ought to live in fresh air both in doors and out,” said Dr.
Hope; ”and I thought this large room would answer as a sort of sitting place for both of you.”