CHAPTER II.
JOHN HENRY'S GHOST STORY.
When the alarm clock went to work the next morning Clara J. turned around and gave it a look that made its teeth chatter.
She had been up and doing an hour before that clock grew nervous enough to crow.
Her enthusiasm was so great that she was a Busy-Lizzie long before 7 o'clock and we were not booked to leave the Choo-Choo House till 10:30.
About 8 o'clock she dragged me away from a dream and I reluctantly awoke to a realization of the fact that I was due to deliver some goods which I had never seen and didn't want to see.
"Get up, John!" Clara J. suggested, with a degree of excitement in her voice; "it's getting dreadfully late and you know I'm all impatience to see that lovely home you've bought for me in the country!"
[Illustration: Clara J.—A Dream of Peaches—Please Pass the
Cream.]
Me under the covers, gnawing holes in the pillow to keep from swearing.
"Oh, dear me!" she sighed, "I'm afraid I'm just a bit sorry to leave this sweet little apartment. We've been so happy here, haven't we?"
I grabbed the ball and broke through the center for 10 yards.
"Sorry," I echoed, tearfully; "why, it's breaking my heart to leave this cozy little collar box of a home and go into a great large country house full of—of—of rooms, and—er—and windows, and—er—and—er—piazzas, and—and—and cows and things like that."
"Of course we wouldn't have to keep the cow in the house," she said, thoughtfully.
"Oh, no," I said, "that's the point. There would be a barn, and you haven't any idea how dangerous barns are. They are the curse of country life, barns are."
"Well, then, John, why did you buy the cow?" she inquired, and I went up and punched a hole in the plaster.
Why did I buy the cow? Was there a cow? Had Bunch ever mentioned a cow to me? Come to think of it he hadn't and there I was cooking trouble over a slow fire.
When I came to she was saying quietly, "Besides, I think I'd rather have a milkman than a cow. Milkmen swear a lot and cheat sometimes but as a rule they are more trustworthy than cows, and they very seldom chase anybody. Couldn't you turn the barn into a gymnasium or something?"
"Dearie," I said, trying my level best to get a mist over my lamps so as to give her the teardrop gaze, "something keeps whispering to me, 'Sidestep that cave in the wilderness!' Something keeps telling me that a month on the farm will put a crimp in our happiness, and that the moment we move into a home in the tall grass ill luck will get up and put the boots to our wedded bliss."
Then I gave an imitation of a choking sob which sounded for all the world like the last dying shriek of a bathtub when the water is busy leaving it.
"Nonsense, John!" laughed Clara J.; "it's only natural that you regret leaving our first home, but after one day in the country you'll be happy as a king."
"Make it a deuce," I muttered; "a dirty deuce at that."
"Now," she said, joyfully; "I'm going to cook your breakfast. This may be your very last breakfast in a city apartment for months, maybe years, so I'm going to cook it myself. I've got every trunk packed—haven't I worked hard? Get up, you lazy boy!" and with this she danced out of the room.
Every trunk packed! Did she intend taking them with her, and if she did how could I stop her?
Back to the woods!
I began to feel like a street just before they put the asphalt down.
For some time I lay there with my brain huddled up in one corner of my head, fluttering and frightened.
Presently an insistent scratch-r-r-r-r aroused me and I began to sit up and notice things.
The things I noticed consisted chiefly of Tacks and the kitchen carving knife. The former was seated on the floor laboriously engineering the latter in an endeavor to produce a large arrow-pierced heart on the polished panel of the bedroom door.
"What's the idea?" I inquired.
"I'm farewelling the place," he answered, mournfully. "They's only two more doors to farewell after I get this one finished. Ain't hearts awful hard to drawr just right, 'specially when the knife slips!"
"You little imp!" I yelled; "do you mean to tell me you've been doing a Swinnerton all over this man's house? S'cat!" and I reached for a shoe.
"Cut it!" cried Tacks, indignantly. "Didn't the janitor say he'd miss me dreadful, and how can he miss me 'less'n he sees my loving rememberments all over the place every time he shows this compartment to somebody else? And it is impolite to go 'way forever and ever amen without farewelling the janitor!"
"Where do you think you're going?" I inquired, trying hard to be calm.
"To the country to live, sister told me," Tacks bubbled; "and we ain't never coming back to this horrid city, sister told me; and you bought the house for a surprise, sister told me; and it has a pizzazus all around it, sister told me; and a cow that gives condensed milk, sister told me; and they's hens and chickens and turkey goblins and a garden to plant potato salad, and they's a barn with pigeons in the attic, and they's a lawn with a barbers wire fence all around it, sister told me; and our trunks are all packed, and we ain't never coming back here no more, sister told me; and I must hurry and farewell them two doors!"
Tacks was slightly in the lead when my shoe reached the door, so he won.
At breakfast we were joined by Uncle Peter and Aunt Martha, both of whom fairly oozed enthusiasm and Clara J.'s pulse began to climb with excitement and anticipation.
I was on the bargain counter, marked down from 30 cents.
Every time Uncle Peter sprang a new idea in reference to his garden, and they came so fast they almost choked him, I felt a burning bead of perspiration start out to explore my forehead.
Presently to put the froth of fear upon my cup of sorrow there came a telegram from "Bunch" which read as follows:
New York ——
John Henry
No. 301 W. 109th St.
Sister and family will move in country house tomorrow be sure to play your game to-day good luck.
Bunch.
"Poor John! you look so worried," said Clara J., anxiously; "I really hope it is nothing that will call you back to town for a week at least. It will take us fully a week to get settled, don't you think so, Aunt Martha?"
I dove into my coffee cup and stayed under a long time. When I came to the surface again Uncle Peter was explaining to Tacks that baked beans grew only in a very hot climate, and in the general confusion the telegram was forgotten by all except my harpooned self.
Clara J. and Aunt Martha were both tearful when we left the flat to ride to the station, but to my intense relief no mention was made of the trunks, consequently I began to lift the mortgage from my life and breathe easier.
On the way out Tacks left a small parcel with one of the hall boys with instructions to hand it to the janitor as soon as possible.
"It's a little present for the janitor in loving remembrance of his memory," Tacks explained with something that sounded like a catch in his voice.
"Hasn't that boy a lovely disposition?" Aunt Martha beamed on Tacks; "to be so forgiving to the janitor after the horrid man had sworn at him and blamed him for putting a cat in the dumb waiter and sending it up to the nervous lady on the seventh floor who abominated cats and who screamed and fell over in a tub of suds when she opened the dumb-waiter door to get her groceries and the cat jumped at her. Mercy! how can the boy be so generous!"
Tacks bore up bravely under this panegyric of praise and his face wore a rapt expression which amounted almost to religious fervor.
"What did you give the janitor, Angel-Face?" I asked.
"Only just another remembrance," Tacks answered, solemnly. "I happened to find a poor, little dead mouse under the gas range and I thought I'd farewell the janitor with it."
Aunt Martha sighed painfully and Uncle Peter chuckled inwardly like a mechanical toy hen.
On the train out to Jiggersville Clara J. was a picture entitled, "The Joy of Living"—kind regards to Mrs. Pat Campbell; Ibsen please write.
As for me with every revolution of the wheels I grew more and more like a half portion of chipped beef.
"Oh, John!" said Clara J., her voice shrill with excitement; "I forgot to tell you! I left my key with Mother, and she's going to superintend the packing of the furniture this afternoon. By evening she expects to have everything loaded in the van and we won't have to wait any time for our trunks and things!"
"Great Scott!" I yelled; "maybe you won't like the house! Maybe it's only a shanty with holes in the roof—er, I mean, maybe you'll be disappointed with the lay-out! What's the blithering sense of being in such a consuming fever about moving the fiendish furniture? I'm certain you'll hate the very sight of this corn-crib out among the ant hills. Can't you back-pedal on the furniture gag and give yourself a chance to hear the answer to what you ask yourself?"
Clara J. looked tearfully at me for a moment; then she went over and sat with Aunt Martha and told her how glad she was we were moving to the country where the pure air would no doubt have a soothing effect on my nerves because I certainly had grown irritable of late.
At last we reached the little old log cabin down the lane and after the first glimpse I knew it was all off.
The place I had borrowed from Bunch for a few minutes was a dream, all right, all right.
With its beautiful lawns and its glistening gravelled walks; with a modern house perfect in every detail; with its murmuring brooklet rushing away into a perspective of nodding green trees and with the bright sunshine smiling a welcome over all it made a picture calculated to charm the most hardened city crab that ever crawled away from the cover of the skyscrapers.
As for Clara J. she simply threw up both hands and screamed for help. She danced and yelled with delight. Then she hugged and kissed me with a thousand reiterated thanks for my glorious present.
I felt as joyous as a jelly fish. Ten-legged microbes began to climb into my pores. Everything I had in my system rushed to my head. I could see myself in the giggle-giggle ward in a bat house, playing I was the king of England.
I was a joke turned upside down.
After they had examined every nook and cranny of the place and had talked themselves hoarse with delight I called them all up on the front piazza for the purpose of putting out their lights with my ghost story.
I figured on driving them all back to the depot with about four paragraphs of creepy talk, so when I had them huddled I began in a hoarse whisper to raise their hair.
I told them that no doubt they had noticed the worried expression on my face and explained that it was due chiefly to the fact that I had learned quite by accident that this beautiful place was haunted.
Tacks grew so excited that he dropped a garden spade off the piazza and into a hot house below, breaking seven panes of glass, but the others only smiled indulgently and I went on.
I jumped head first into my most blood-curdling story and related in detail how a murder had been committed on the very site the house was built on and how a fierce bewhiskered spirit roamed the premises at night and demanded vengeance. I described in awful words the harrowing spectacle and all I got at the finish was the hoot from Uncle Peter.
"Poor John," said Clara J., "I had no idea you were so run down. Why, you're almost on the verge of nervous prostration. And how thoughtful you were to pick out a haunted house, for I do love ghosts. Didn't you know that? I'll tell you what let's do. I'll give a prize for the first one who sees and speaks to this unhappy spirit—won't it be jolly? Where are you going, John?"
"Me, to the undertakers—I mean I must run back to town. That telegram this morning—important business—forgot all about it—see you later—don't breathe till I get back—I mean, don't live till I—Oh! the devil!"
Just then I fell over the lawn mower, picked myself up hastily and rushed off to town to find Bunch for I was certainly up against it good and hard.