CHAPTER IX
Mr. Tescheron became badly involved by swallowing the bait, hook and line, in my joke about notifying the coroner. When I went to bed at last, wearied with deep thinking and the sending of messages, he began again on a new line which I had not figured on. I supposed he would see the folly of proceeding farther, conclude that I knew more about Jim Hosley than his man, Smith, return home and wait to see me again before going ahead. But he didn't seem to realize that I was only joking. I was so plain-spoken about it—put the thing so broadly—that I supposed any sane man would understand I was merely stating my loyalty to Jim in terms of sarcasm. All jokes to fathers-in-law of the Tescheron inflammable character should, however, be labeled in big letters, the same as the dynamite they ship on a railroad, accompanied by the Traffic Association's book entitled, "Rules for the Handling of Explosives."
To Mr. Tescheron it was a most serious matter to consider his family entangled in a betrothal following immediately the commission of an awful crime by the man who had won his daughter's hand. I had informed him in my little joke that none could escape the coroner's subpœna unless they left the State. He had traveled very little in this country, and knew few places out of the State where he could be comfortable with his family till the affair blew over. The Tescherons spent their summers at the quiet village of Stukeville, where they had a comfortable country house; it was not pretentious, but it was beautifully situated on a knoll, overlooking the neighboring lake, and from the broad verandas a glimpse of the distant, more densely inhabited portion of the town might be obtained. But it was not possible to fly to Stukeville, because that is situated in New York. He had once stopped at a hotel in Hoboken overnight, before taking one of the German steamers for France. He knew the place, and he would have his family there before eight o'clock that morning. He informed Smith that he would stop with his family in the Stuffer House, Hoboken, N. J., just beyond the jurisdiction of the subpœna servers of the New York coroners, and he accordingly hastened home to move in the early morning, his wife, daughter, one servant and enough of their belongings to supply the apartments of the Stuffer House with a few of the cosy comforts of a soft-cushioned and warm-slippered home.
Now, I meant no harm to anybody, and certainly not to the innocent women of the Tescheron family, when I airily lied about the coroner. At the other end of the line the joke exploded, and not long after I had touched the fuse with my last telegram. Think of driving the Tescheron family out of the State! Why, nothing could have been farther away from my mind, but what happened only goes to show that theoretical knowledge of love begets idiocy, while the XXX variety of A1 purity cannot be fooled, but travels with sure steps the path of service guided by wisdom that springs from a devoted heart.
"Marie, Marie! Wake up and dress! Gabrielle, the worst has happened! Quick, we must be in Hoboken in half an hour! Do as I say. Ask no questions. Arrest awaits you if you delay. What! Aren't you going to stir? Why do you lie there, Marie? Be quick!"
Briefly and excitedly Mr. Tescheron outlined to his startled family what had taken place. He told them of the awful crime and Hosley's connection with it, fully convinced that it had all happened just as Smith had reported and satisfied that the Jim Hosley of our household was the guilty villain. He heaped on a violent denunciation of Hosley, using many of Smith's phrases, and he illustrated his comments with a few additional incidents in that infamous career taken from the forgery cases and the borderland episodes. As a Californian would say, "he burned him up."
Thus at 4 a. m., just as I was turning in to take my last nap in our dear, dilapidated paradise, and Jim was fidgeting himself into the mental attitude which would call for a turkey bath, Mr. Tescheron was sustaining the movement of the play by wildly arousing his family to flight.
"Albert, you are all unstrung again, my dear," remonstrated Mrs. Tescheron, who was in no position at that time to be described. "Take some of those tablets to quiet your nerves—"
Mr. Tescheron had no time for the taking of sedatives. He rushed away to call Katie, the maid, and to telephone for a coach. When he returned, his exasperation knew no bounds, for his good wife had not stirred from her warm couch. This was too much. From that point Hosley received the worst denunciations; his ferocity made the wife murderers of criminal history and the cruel Roman emperors seem like mud-pie and croquet efforts in this line of infamy. The entreaty was then renewed.
"Come, come, Marie, do not be foolish, my dear. Get up and get ready. I have awakened Katie and she is here to help you pack a small steamer trunk and a dress-suit case. Gabrielle! Gabrielle!"
"Yes, father, let us start," replied Gabrielle, and she entered her mother's room, rosy and wide-awake, with her gown faultlessly arranged and her hat on straight. Her fire-alarm father found her right there to give him all the rope he needed to hang himself. Gabrielle's gloves were on and buttoned. Her neatly rolled umbrella was under her left arm and in her right hand she carried a new leather bag. There were no signs of wonder in her face; perhaps a touch of sadness might have been noted as she glanced at her poor mother in pity; but she was far above the influences which agitated her father and drove him into precipitate action. Gabrielle, with the assistance of the maid, soon persuaded Mrs. Tescheron and prepared her for departure into that foreign land vaguely situated on the map of the earth, as she remembered it. With heavy sighs and gasps she told where things could be found and how Bridget, the cook, was to feed the parrot. She would take the parrot, but she did not know if the air of Hoboken agreed with birds. While undergoing the process of hasty preparation, she remembered a number of things that would need attention that morning, so it was necessary also to bring Bridget in with a quilt around her—there being no time then for her to dress—to take orders.
When the drowsy Bridget was hustled in to receive instructions, she was not a tidy-looking cook, and until Mr. Tescheron withdrew, she kept the quilt entirely over her head, for her womanly spirit had not yet been stiffened to defiantly glare at man by those delicate touches—the pasting on of her front hair-piece; the tying on of her back switch to the diminutive stump of original tresses; the proper adjustment of her dental fixtures, her collar and tie and the various articles constituting the sub-structure necessary for their support. We cannot go into the details, because the plans and specifications are missing. Bridget held that quilt with her hands and mouth to keep behind the scenes as much as possible.
"Bridget, we are called away this morning," said Mrs. Tescheron. "Where to in Hoboken, my dear Gabrielle? We must leave the address."
Gabrielle called down the hall to her father, who shouted back so that Bridget might have heard if buried under the product of a quilt mill:
"Stuffer House! Stuffer House!"
"It's a pretty name, ma'am," said Bridget. "I'll bet their pancakes taste like this quilt. You'll not be gone long, ma'am? Is it near Stukeville, ma'am?"
"No, no, Bridget, it's nowhere near Stukeville. I wish it were. It's in Hoboken, New Jersey, Bridget. Gabrielle, please write it down for her. Tidy up this room, Bridget, and if anybody calls, say we are away visiting for a few days—"
"In Hoebroken, ma'am?"
"Out of town will answer, and write me how things are going. Do not use soap again when you wash the shell in the aquarium. If the parrot becomes lonesome—you can always tell because he goes back to swearing—let him hear the phonograph for half an hour night and morning, if you are too busy to ring the dinner bell to amuse him. Be careful about the gas—so many girls are dying that way now—but whatever you do, do not neglect the parrot; he is such a comfort to me and is such a good parrot. He has reformed so much since—"
"Aren't you ready yet, my dear? The coach is here!" shouted Mr. Tescheron, who was anxiously pacing the hall, watch in hand. It was 4:30; a whole half hour had passed and Hoboken had not yet been sighted, whereas visions of the coroner's agents and scarehead publicity were everywhere.
"Yes! Yes! Be patient, Albert; we are nearly ready. And, Bridget, I wish you would make up a pound cake and a fruit cake, and send them to me by express, for we shall miss your cooking so much." Mrs. Tescheron was a good manager of Bridget, who had served her over ten years, and she knew the value of a little appreciation. The last time they moved, Bridget had been hurried into the yard to bring the clothes-poles, but she was so long about it that Mrs. Tescheron went to look for her. Bridget in those emerald days knew little of clothes-poles, the sticks they used to keep the sagging line up, but was bent on moving the clothes-posts, an entirely different variety in the forestry of a city back yard. The four posts were firmly planted in three feet of hard-packed dirt. She bent her stout back to the task of bringing them up root and all, and with a winding hold of bulging arms and feet braced to the flagging she yanked, tugged and strained, turned boiling red and spluttered brogue anathema. Mrs. Tescheron found her thus engaged.
"The bloomin' t'ings is sthuck in the dirrt, ma'am, but I'll take the axe to 'em."
Mrs. Tescheron had frequently told this story with pride in close relation to some modern instance of Bridget's cleverness in domestic service to set off the then and now, with the reflections of credit for the mistress the historical anecdote involved. No harm could come to the home in Bridget's hands, Mrs. Tescheron believed; but no woman could leave without giving orders. When Bridget moved away, sure she had everything in mind just as it was to receive attention, Mrs. Tescheron gazed about the room blankly as if she knew something must have been overlooked, till her eyes rested on her calm, patient daughter, the harbor in every domestic storm.
"Gabrielle, my dear," asked Mrs. Tescheron softly, "are you sure this Mr. Hosley is the strong, brave man you think he is? Remember, darling, I have said little to you about him—but really he seems to have greatly upset your father, and having done that, of course, our home is involved. All I ask of you, my dear, is, are you sure? That is all. I know how easily your father is led away to follow the bent of his own desires and I know you, too, my dear—you are my own sober, thoughtful father again. Tell me, Gabrielle, are you sure?"
"I am perfectly sure, mother. Father places more faith in hearsay and in the statements of the knaves who are leading him on, than he does in anything we can say. I am glad to have your confidence, mother. My plan is to allow father to do as he wills, so that he may run the full length of his folly. To me, it is most foolish and absurd; but why argue with father if we would convince him? You know all we can do is to let him act as he pleases. He shall not make you uncomfortable, mother. I will let him storm and rage, but he must not send you to some horrible hotel to live away from your friends. I will—"
"But you will stay there with me, Gabrielle, will you not?"
"I shall see that you are comfortably settled there and then I shall be with you as much as possible—but I cannot involve the office in these wild capers. Come, or we shall be scolded. Wouldn't it be fine, mother, if we could tame father? But cheer up, mother; we may laugh last about this. Let us see the bright side which is—Come! You hear him."
Mother and daughter descended the one flight of stairs arm in arm, preceded by the impatient guide, who was calculating on every circumstance that might arise between Ninety-sixth Street and the Hoboken ferry. Katie trailed behind with bags and shawl-strap bundles. A small steamer trunk that Katie had filled with things easy to find had been placed on the front of the coach by the driver, who evidently regarded the job as the early departure of a European party.
When the three women were stowed in the coach after less than an hour's preparation, with their sleep rudely disturbed and without even a cup of coffee to vanquish the chill of the early morn, it may be assumed that they were not more cheerful than the dismal gray of the town. The man of the inside party had been awake all night; he was feverish and fretful, but he had nothing to say in the presence of the servant. Katie probably believed there had been a death in the family, and they were hastily driving to the home of some relative. Most of the conversation was between Mrs. Tescheron and Katie, and was carried on in whispers. Mrs. Tescheron drew forth the information that about a dozen things she would not need were in the trunk, and several score of necessities had been left at home.
"I remember the Stuffer House," said Mrs. Tescheron, making bold to address her daughter. "Don't you remember four years ago we stopped there overnight? It's named, I suppose, for the proprietor, who told me he was of the same family as the Stevenses of Hoboken. Yes, I remember, he said Stevens, Steffens, Stuffens and Stuffers all came from the same family."
"I remember the stuffed birds everywhere," said Gabrielle; "many of them exceedingly rare specimens, I believe some one said. Somehow, I have always connected stuffed birds with the Stuffer House. It did not occur to me that Stuffer was the name of the proprietor. How odd!"
But conversation did not flow freely, for the tension of the occasion had been too tightly wound by the impulsive guardian of the family's honor. It was well that Katie was present to check his temper, through pride, or the poor women might have been scolded again for their dangerous delay, as coroners go forth early with their guns loaded for game hiding in coaches.
It was even more dismal, cold and damp in the ferryboat. Mrs. Tescheron fell quietly into tears there. This overflow of her emotions was not noticed by Mr. Tescheron, who looked steadily out of the window at the moving engines. Gabrielle saw her mother crying, and was at once overcome with pity; to Katie it seemed as if she was on the point of sharing her mother's grief for the loved one now mourned. Katie could see that Mrs. Tescheron had thought a good deal of the person, whoever it might be, and that Miss Tescheron had shared in this regard. Mr. Tescheron, on the other hand, seemed to be provoked that it had happened until the boat struck the Hoboken pier, and then he looked out of the coach window with a smile, indicating a change of opinion. The smile was that of the conquering hero, outgeneraling in retreat allied forces outnumbering his small army a thousand times. A great head, thought Mr. Tescheron, may beat the law, especially if it keeps awake all night to be on the field early in the morning.
The Stuffer House, founded by the great-grandfather of the present proprietor, August Stuffer, was situated not far from the ferry and steamship piers. Its Colonial front and three stories of red brick, and windows with small panes, gave it the air of a Washington's headquarters, which Mr. Stuffer could undoubtedly prove it had been, for his tales were the most convincing arguments that the hostelry had been named by a whimsical fate not too dignified to stoop to punning. There were times when the hungry boarders thought the name facetious, but they conceded it to be quite exact in a descriptive sense, if its brick and mortar were intended to honor monumentally the tales of the host. His first name, August, was not an adjective of limitation as to time, for the proprietor was A. Stuffer every month and day in the year; and his son Emil, a quiet, inoffensive student of birds, a taxidermist, ornithologist and mechanical engineer, and a graduate of the neighboring Stevens Institute, world-famed for the breadth and thoroughness of its training, was a worthy son in practically applying to birds abundant science and all the art employed by his father to hold and encourage trade among the guests.
It was about 6 o'clock when the Tescheron coach drew up at the old port-cochère, and no one but the night clerk was about. He swung the great door open and welcomed them to the hotel office, a large living-room, with a wide brick and rubble fireplace in one corner, dimly lighted by a log fitfully blazing, fed by scant draughts, so deeply was it choked by the pile of ashes from the logs that had served to brighten the busy room the night before. It is important to note this fireplace, for long afterward, when I went forth to gather impressions at first hand, and there heard Mr. Stuffer and his guests warm to the discussion of every topic under the sun, I decided that the glow of inspiration and the stimulating incense of resinous knots, arising from that corner, cast the witchery which wrought conviction in the minds of men less wary than Mr. Tescheron, who might, indeed, have renounced all his worldly possessions had he remained more than six weeks under its spell to escape the horrors of an entanglement in the meshes of foul crime across the river. I see now how it must have affected him—this fireplace talk. Steam heat is the only thing to preserve a man's common sense, and if he be shy of that desirable faculty he should be extremely careful when listening or talking, even under the weak spell of a gilt radiator. It is a fact of science that certain rays of light exert a hypnotic influence that may be employed to effect anesthesia for minor operations. Perhaps it was the influence of these rays; I know not. Nervous persons are especially subject to their vibrations, and when sitting before an open wood fire, highly productive of this subtle chemicalization, the victims become drowsy and fall easily into the mood of the most extravagant speaker. Minor operations, under which head we may include the extraction of a tooth or a bank balance, are then simple, if the operator be calm and skillful in the handling of his instruments—often mere words, but powerful tools under these favorable conditions.
The hotel clerk was assured that the Tescherons did not intend to take a steamer or a train; that they might remain a day or two, perhaps longer, and would need four rooms and a bath on the sunny side of the house, on the second floor, away from the elevator and the noise of the kitchen. They would take breakfast as soon as it could be served.
"No breakfast for me, thank you, papa. I am going right over to the office now. Good-bye, mother dear; Katie, look after her well. I shall return early. Good-bye—" and Gabrielle turned to kiss her father, having embraced her tearful mother. But he could not recover himself to display his affection at that time.
"Gabrielle, you surely are not going! You surely are not! Think of the consequences and accept my judgment in this awful extremity!"
"Father, you may have your own way in everything, but my business affairs must not be involved. The coach is going. I'll ride back in it."
Quickly she kissed him and darted out of the door and into the carriage and away.