THE SOCIAL HOUSE.
The large building which had caused so much comment was at length finished, and the mystery solved. It was indeed a mansion, with rooms for recreation and study, but it was neither for young Early, nor any other one person. It was, instead, the joint property of all the village, and to be known as the Littleton Social House. On the lower floor was a library, with well-lighted nooks, to be used as reading-rooms; beyond that were the art-rooms one for modeling in clay, one for sketching, and a third inner, sky-lighted, place for photography. On the other side of the great hall was a large music-room with a canvas floor, containing a piano and cabinet organ, also shelves for music numbers, and a raised dais for art orchestra. Beyond was a pleasant parlor, from which opened a small apartment provided with conveniences for quiet table games; and all these were neatly fitted with strong easy chairs, tables, and cabinets, the walls being beautified with many good photographs from paintings of masters, both old and new.
The supposed "ball-room," above, developed into a gymnasium and entertainment hall, with a rostrum and curtains, where lectures, concerts, pictured views, and little dramas might be given; and surrounding this were roof balconies, with palms, vines, and potted plants, making them into bowers of beauty and coolness. Here were seats and tables where the warm and weary might stray for a cooling drink of lemonade, or an ice, served at a price within the means of the very poor. A trim little widow, whose husband when living had been a trusted employee, and who was trying her best to raise her young family without him, had been set up in this restaurant, apparently by Mr. Dalton, and provided with the necessary outfit, for which she was to pay a living rental during the summer months. The chance seemed heaven-sent to the poor young creature, who had nearly succumbed before her heavy toil at the washtub, for she was too delicately formed for such labors.
The janitorship of the whole large building brought independence to another family where the capable mother dying had left a crippled husband and two young girls to struggle on as best they could. With the youthful help of these sturdy girls he could undertake the office of caretaker, and, as pretty living rooms were furnished them in the high, airy basement, the family felt almost as if they had been transported to Paradise after the terrible experiences of the past winter, with a mere shed for shelter, the coal running short at too frequent intervals, and meat only compassed as a rare luxury on the "lucky" days when one or the other could pick up an extra nickel, or two, by some special good fortune.
To all the questions and conjectures over this miracle of a house Mr. Dalton opposed an impassive front. "It is none of my doing," he averred brusquely. "I never should have thought of it, and wouldn't have built it if I had, no matter who furnished the money, for I don't believe you'll appreciate it, or take care of it. But all I've got to say is, if any one of you do abuse it, and go to spitting on the floor, or hacking up the woodwork, or pulling things out of shape in any way, you'll be lower than any truck that I care to have around, and you'll have me to deal with when I'm at my ugliest—you understand what that means!"
The men, who had been grouped in the yard after hours, talking it over, and whose hail for information as he passed by had brought out his vigorous remarks, looked at each other and grinned half sheepishly. Then one spoke up sturdily:
"I guess we know good manners when we see 'em, boss! We ain't pigs, nor tramps."
Dalton laughed in his curt fashion.
"You know well enough, but you don't care pretty often. If young Early is decent enough to give you boys a chance at some pleasure, you want to show you appreciate it—that's all. And when you get your invite to the house-warming, you'll be expected to show up as the gentlemen you can be when you try."
Billy May, once a sailor, straightened up and touched his cap.
"Ay, ay, sir!" he bellowed, as if receiving orders in a towering gale, at which all laughed and Dalton, smiling in spite of himself, passed on.
The invitations came in good time, and were in a somewhat comprehensive form, each being addressed to the householder in person, with the words, "and whole family" added. No family was forgotten, but as the building could not accommodate the whole village, two evenings were set for the reception and opening, all the names up to N, in alphabetical order, being chosen for Tuesday evening and the rest for Wednesday, while different hours were mentioned that there need be no crowding, though it was discovered later that no matter at which hour one arrived, the most of them staid till the very latest mentioned, loth even then to leave the, to them, novel scene.
A day or two before this pleasant event, which had set the whole town into a delightful turmoil of expectation and comment, a couple of families quietly moved into the two neat, but by no means sumptuous dwellings, lately built on the little knoll over against the broad end of the park, and facing it. You will remember that the school-house was at one side, the church near by, while the Social house fronted the narrow point, with a street between. Thus the two homes overlooked park and buildings, exactly facing the Social house, though at a distance, while the Works at the other extreme of the village were half hidden by intervening buildings, and soon would be quite overshadowed by the many trees lately set out.
These were the homes which Joyce had built for herself and the Bonnivels. Both of them, though fitted with many conveniences and finished with taste, were of moderate cost, there being not one extravagance, and only the modicum of room actually needed for refined living, in either. Many a rich woman has thought nothing of putting more expense into the fitting of one room, even, than Joyce had laid out on her whole house. Indeed that reserved for Madame was much the costlier of the two. Yet, with the pretty outlook across the green triangle before the doors, the high situation, the soft roll of the lawns surrounding them, and the majesty of the one immense maple which stood between the buildings, and had grown for a quarter of a century in lordly majesty, appropriating to itself all the juices of the soil for yards around, until it was the famed landmark of that region, these places were more attractive than many more palatial which fairly daunt the stranger with their cold magnificence. These smiled in one's face with a hospitable welcome.
Moving was not a difficult operation for Joyce, as she had little heavy furniture to take from the hotel; and it had been a labor of love and jollity to run about with Dorette and Camille, selecting and arranging, first submitting everything to Madame's superior and almost faultless judgment. And here the girl's passion for sharing—she liked the word better than giving—often asserted itself. Obstinately declaring that she should be wretched in a home where everything "smelled of its newness," she had coaxed and cajoled her friends until, almost without their realizing it, there had been such a division of the old Bonnivel effects and the new Lavillotte purchases that both houses presented a pretty equal mingling of the ancient and modern. For instance, Joyce begged the small round table with claw legs from their dining-room, to send in its place one of the handsomest large mahogany rounds she could procure. So Ellen's room was neatly furnished with Madame Bonnivel's square heavy set, stately if not graceful, while the latter's bloomed out with pier-glass and satinwood of the daintiest. The Bonnivels' worn cane chairs somehow found places on Joyce's veranda, while a new half-dozen rockers, of quaint and comfortable shape, took their places through the pretty living rooms next door.
"I feel," said Joyce gaily, "so much more respectable than if my things were all new. These good old plantation souvenirs give to my indefinite outlines a deep rich background that brings me out in stronger colors."
For, with all her wealth and power, Joyce often felt this "indefiniteness," as she called it. She knew people were wont to ask, "Who is she? Where is her family?" and to look with some misgiving on a girl too rich to pass unnoticed, yet too poor to own a family and a past about which she was free to babble. She found that riches set one out from the crowd as does the search-light which cannot be dodged nor dimmed, and sometimes she would have flung every dollar away, and given up all her pet schemes, just to have crept into the safe shelter of the Bonnivel home as a real child of that house, to become as happily obscure as Dorette, or Camille.
The Tuesday night of the first house-warming fortunately fell upon a cool evening, when no one could much mind the occasional sprinkle of rain, so glad were they of a change from the fierce heat and drought of the past fortnight. As it was, the clouds brooded low, and the breeze held the freshness of showers near by, while now and then the moon peered through a rift and lit up the hushed darkness, which was like that of a chamber where sleep comes after pain.
The Social house, gleaming with electric lights to the very summit of the flag-staff above its roof, from which the stars and stripes waved in languid contentment, was not only near the center of the town, geographically, but also in aim and interest, to-night. The half-world which was not invited till to-morrow was anxious to see how the other half would look in gala costume, to-night; and a stranger, suddenly dropped into the neighboring streets, would have had to look twice to convince himself these neat-looking females, tripping that way, were the wives and daughters of artisans who worked for a few shillings a day. Fortunately summer dress-goods cost little, and there were but few of the girls who had not compassed a new six-cent muslin, or at least "done up" an old one into crisp freshness. The men were equally disguised by soap, water, and shaving, with coats instead of shirt-sleeves, but these could not simulate the fine gentleman so readily as could their daughters the fine lady.
Among these self-respecting Americanized families there was occasionally seen a sprinkling of those who disdained any approach to dudishness, or had not yet grasped it as anything that could possibly pertain to themselves, and these—mostly new importations from Poland or Italy—strode dauntlessly up to the wide-open doors in the deep Grecian portico, the men in clumping shoes and the women in little head shawls, jabbering noisily with wonder and curiosity.
Mr. Dalton, under sealed orders, had placed himself, with his aunt, near the outer doorway of the broad entrance hall to receive the guests, and when Joyce's party appeared all were welcomed exactly as had been the other arrivals.
Their entrance was rather imposing, though, despite precautions, for first came Larry with Madame, then Dorette with Joyce, and lastly Camille leading Dodo, with Ellen stalking at their side, the very picture of a duenna. Somewhat in the rear Gilbert and two other maids, Kate and Thyrza—this latter from the Bonnivel house—followed with dubious looks, feeling probably that they were neither "fish flesh, nor good red herring," in this motley assemblage, which offered no such companionship as they were accustomed to.
Joyce's eyes shone like stars, and even in her plain white Suisse gown, without an ornament except the rings upon her fingers, there was a sort of regal splendor about her that made every eye turn to watch her as she entered. After Mrs. Phelps had greeted them all with evident pleasure at having them for neighbors, they found an easy-chair for Madame, where she might listen and feel the happy surging of the crowd about her. As soon as seated she gently pushed Joyce away.
"Go," she whispered. "You want to see and talk with as many as possible. I shall do nicely alone. All of you go, and then you can tell me more when you come back. It will be fun to compare experiences. Who has Dodo?"
"I have her just this minute," said Camille, "but she has sighted Larry and I can't hold her. He is talking to two men in the window at your left, and looking handsome as a picture! There, for goodness' sake, go, if you must! I do believe the little tyke has torn my new dimity, clutching at it so. Come, Joyce, let's go and speak to those girls. They look positively wretched in their best clothes, poor things!"
"You go," said Joyce. "I see my old friend Mrs. Hemphill—Rachel's mother, you know. See her, there with the three children? We must make the most of ourselves, and you can jolly up the girls better than I. I'm going to bring some of the interesting people to you, ma mère. You'll know how to talk to all of them, but you shan't be bored!"
"We need no special vocabulary to be kind," smiled Madame. "I will soon make friends right here, and I'm not afraid of being bored. People always talk to the blind, and smile on the deaf. Run along!"
Joyce gave her a love-pat, and hurried after Mrs. Hemphill who, with a strong grasp on her little ones, was stemming the tide of humanity with a somewhat defiant mien, while her head was swinging around as if on a pivot, so determined was she not to miss the sight of a single decoration or picture, nor the passing of a single guest. She stopped to speak to a much wrinkled dame in a real Irish bonnet, with a flapping frill, who was smiling so broadly as to display with reckless abandon her toothless gums.
"Purty foin, ain't it?" this one laughed, as they stopped abreast of each other so suddenly that the babies nearly fell over backward. "And say," lowering her voice so that Joyce barely caught the words, "they do be tellin' they's to be sand-whiches, an' coffee, an' rale ice-crame byme-by. Does ye b'lave it?"
"Umph! It gets me what to b'lieve, these days," muttered Mrs. Hemphill, with a backward slap at one of the children who, upon hearing the enumeration of goodies, began to tease for some. "What's ailin' you now?" she cried fiercely. "Want somepin to eat, you say? You want a trouncin', that's what you want!" lifting the little thing with a motion tenderer than her words. "Ain't it all the craziest doin's? But say, Mis' Flaherty, they tells me you won't go into one of the new houses, nohow."
"And why should I, tell me thot!" began Mrs. Flaherty on a high key, just as Joyce stepped graciously forward, with the words,
"Isn't this the Mrs. Hemphill I remember?"
The latter turned quickly.
"Hey? Oh, why yes, I do mind you now. Let's see, you come to sell a washin' machine, didn't you? Or was it a story-paper? Oh! no, now I know," darting suspicious glances over the head of the child in her arms, "you was talkin' about schools and tryin' to get one up."
"Well, partly," answered Joyce, rather crestfallen, and glanced up to meet the dancing eyes of Larry, who was passing by and caught the high-keyed sentence. "But you know I have come here to live now, and I assure you I am not a teacher—just a private citizen."
"Do tell! Well, I thought you was something or other—they's sech a raft of agents along; though my Mary tells me 'tain't a circumstance to the city—Mate works out in the city. Let me make you acquainted with Mis' Flaherty. She's the lady what lives in Bachelor's Row and takes in boarders and washin's—now, Johnny, you stop a-tuggin' at my skirts, will ye? You've started the gethers a'ready.—She ain't exactly a bachelor herself, but she's next to it—a widder woman. He! he!"
Mrs. Hemphill's laughter was so much like the "crackling of thorns under a pot" as to be far from pleasant. Joyce hastened to speak.
"But I can't see why you preferred not to move, Mrs. Flaherty. Don't you like the new houses?" she asked, a bit anxiously, looking from one to the other and feeling decidedly wet-blanketed.
"Oh, they'll do," nodding the cap frills vigorously. "It ain't fur the loikes o' me to be sayin' anythin' agin 'em, but I never did take to these new-fangled doin's, 'm. I've heered tell how them water pipes'll be afther busting up with the first frost, just like an old gun, and I don't want any sich doin's on my premises. No sir! I ain't so old but I can pump water out of a well yet, and it's handy enough.' 'Tain't more'n just across the strate, and whin 'tain't dusty, nur snowy, nur muddy, it's all right enough."
"Well, I don't carry water when I can make it run by turning a stopple—not much I don't!" cried Mrs. Hemphill vigorously, meanwhile tilting back and forth on heels and toes with a jolting motion which was gradually producing drowsiness in the infant she held. "And my man says it can't freeze in them pipes 'cause the nateral gas is goin' to run day and night and keep 'em hot. And Nate Tierney, he says 't water an' heat an' lightin' is goin' to be jest as free, in our town, as sunshine an' air is everywhere. That's what Nate says, and if it's true it's a mighty big load off 'n us poor folks, and that's certain!"
"But we're goin' to be taxed for 'em," put in another woman, joining the group—a lanky creature with washed-out eyes, and lips that she seemed in danger of swallowing, so sunken were they.
"How's that?" cried Mrs. Hemphill, sharply.
"It's to be some way put onto the men in their drink and tobacco—so my man says—and it'll make it a cent more on a glass and a plug. My man says everybody what brings any into this town's got to pay somethin' fur the privilege, and that goes into the heatin' and lightin' fund. And he says it's a blamed shame, and the men won't stand it, either! Fur's that's concerned, what do they care whether we're warm or cold, so 't they gits their dram?"
Just here Rachel Hemphill came rapidly towards them.
"Mother," she began, then looked askance at Joyce, whose eyes, now somewhat troubled, turned eagerly to meet her glance.
"Well, what is it now?" asked the mother crossly, for, though she liked nothing better than to sit and praise Rachel by the hour, she always kept her belligerent attitude toward her family, as if afraid she might relent too much if she once gave way an inch.
"I was going to say," the girl continued excitedly, with another glance at Joyce, "you'll miss the concert, if you don't hurry. It's upstairs in the big room, and they're all hustling for seats. And mother," dropping to a whisper, "our Kip is to sing!"
"Kip? You don't say! Who told you? Let's hurry! Johnny, come along and stop dragging your feet. I'll lay the babby down some'ers and go right up; he's sound fur an hour or two, I hope. You're coming, Rache?"
"Yes, in a minute," for Joyce had stepped towards her with outstretched hand, partly barring her way.
"My name is Lavillotte," she said, "and I have seen you several times. The Bonnivels and I have just moved into the two houses at the other end of the park, and we want to get acquainted with our neighbors."
Rachel's cool fingers dropped into Joyce's eager jeweled ones, and fell away again.
"You will find but a small set of your kind of people here, Miss Lavillotte. There's the doctor's family, Mr. Dalton's, and one or two others. I'm just one of the working girls," and before Joyce could speak to protest she had turned away with a proud look, and hastened after her mother.