Molly Brown of Kentucky

CHAPTER XIV.

THE CABLEGRAM

“Tingaling, aling, aling! Phome a ringin’ agin! I bet that’s Mr. Paul,” declared Caroline, the present queen of the Chatsworth kitchen. “I kin tell his ring ev’y time. I’m a goin’ ter answer it, Miss Molly.”

Molly, who was ironing the baby’s cap strings and bibs (work she never trusted any one to do), smiled. It was one of Caroline’s notions that each person had a particular way of ringing the telephone. She was always on the alert to answer the “phome,” and would stop anything she was doing and tear to be first to take down the receiver, although it always meant that some member of the family must come and receive the message which usually was perfectly unintelligible to the willing girl.

The telephone was in the great old dining room, because, as Mrs. Brown said, every one would call up at meal time and if you were there, you were there. Molly followed Caroline to the dining room, knowing full well that she would be needed when once the preliminaries were over. She gathered the cap strings and bibs, now neatly ironed and ready for the trip to Wellington that she would sooner or later have to take.

Still no news from the Hirondelle de Mer, that is, no news from Kent. The last boat load of sailors and passengers had been taken up, but none of them could say for sure whether the two Kentuckians had been saved or not. One man insisted he had seen the submarine stop and take something or some one on board, but when closely questioned he was quite hazy as to his announcement. Jimmy Lufton had kept the cables hot trying to find out something. The Browns and Jim Castleman’s sister had communicated with each other on the subject of the shipwrecked boys.

“‘Low!” she heard Caroline mutter with that peculiarly muffled tone that members of her race always seem to think they must assume when speaking through the telephone. “This here is Mrs. Brown’s res-i-d-e-n-c-e! Yessir! This here is Ca’line at the phome. Yessir! Miss Molly done made yo’ maw eat her breakfus’ in the baid. No, sir, not to say sick in the baid – yessir, kinder sick on the baid. Yessir! Miss Molly is a launderin’ of the cap ties fer the baby. We is all well, sir, yessir. I’ll call Miss Molly.”

Of course she hung up the receiver before Molly could drop her cap strings and reach the telephone.

“Oh, Caroline, why did you hang it up? Was it Mr. Paul?”

“Yassum! It were him. I done tole you I could tell his ring. I hung up the reception cause I didn’t know you was so handy, an’ I thought if I kep it down, it might was’e the phome somehow, while I went out to fetch you.”

Molly couldn’t help laughing, although it was very irritating for Caroline to be so intensely stupid about telephoning. Paul, knowing Caroline’s ways, rang up again in a moment and Molly was there ready to get the message herself.

“Molly, honey, are you well? Is Mother well? How is the baby?”

“All well, Paul! Any news?”

“Good news, Molly!” Molly dropped all the freshly ironed finery and leaned against the wall for support. “A cablegram from Spain! Kent was landed there by the German submarine.”

“Kent! Are you sure?”

“As sure as shootin’! Let me read it to you – ‘Safe – well, Kent.’ Tell Mother as soon as you can, Molly, but go easy with it. Good news might knock her out as much as bad news. I’ll be out with John as fast as his tin Lizzie can buzz us.”

“Safe! Kent alive and well!”

Molly’s knees were trembling so she could hardly get to her mother’s room, where that good lady had been pretending to eat her breakfast in bed. Old Shep, standing by her bedside, had a suspiciously greasy expression around his mouth and was very busy licking his lips, which imparted the information to the knowing Molly that her mother’s dainty breakfast had disappeared to a spot to which it was not destined by the two anxious cooks, Molly and Caroline.

“Molly, what is it? I heard the ’phone ring. Was it Paul?”

“Yes, Mother! Good news!”

Mrs. Brown closed her eyes and lay back on her pillows, looking so pale that Molly was scared. How fragile the good lady was! Her profile was more cameo-like than ever. These few weeks of waiting, in spite of the brave front she had shown to the world, had told on her. Could she stand good news any better than she could bad?

“Kent?” she murmured faintly.

“Yes, Mother, a cablegram! ‘Safe, well, Kent.’”

“Where?”

“Spain, I don’t know what part.”

And then the long pent-up flood gates were opened and Mrs. Brown and Molly had such a cry as was never seen or heard of. The cap strings that Molly had dropped on the floor when she heard that there was news, she had gathered up in one wild swoop on the way to her mother’s room, and these were first brought into requisition to weep on, and then the sheets and the napkin from the breakfast tray, and at last even old Shep had to get damp.

“I bus’ stop ad gall up Zue ad Ad Zarah. Oh, Bother, Bother, how good God is!”

“Yes, darling, He is good whether our Kent was spared to us or not,” said Mrs. Brown, showing much more command of her consonants than poor Molly.

Caroline appeared, one big grin, bearing little Mildred in her arms.

“She done woke up an’ say ter me: ‘Ca’line, what all dis here rumpus ’bout?’”

As Mildred had as yet said nothing more than “Goo! Goo!” that brought the smiles to Molly and Mrs. Brown.

“Lawd Gawd a mussy! Is Mr. Kent daid? Is that what Mr. Paul done phomed? I mus’ run tell Aunt Mary. I boun’ ter be the fust one.”

“No, no, Caroline! Mr. Kent is alive and well.”

“‘Live an’ well! Well, Gawd be praised! When I come in an’ foun’ you all a actin’ lak what the preacher says will be in the las’ day er jedgment, a weepin’ an’ wailin’ an’ snatchin’ er teeth, I say ter myse’f: ‘Ca’line, that there dream you had ’bout gittin’ ma’id was sho’ sign er death, drownin’ referred.’ Well, Miss Molly, if’n you’ll hol’ the baby, I’ll go tell Aunt Mary the good news, too. Cose ’tain’t quite so scrumptious to be the fust ter carry good news as ’tis bad, but then news is news.”

Sue was telephoned to immediately and joined in the general rejoicing. Aunt Sarah Clay was quite nonplussed for a moment because of the attitude she had taken about the family mourning, but her affection for her sister, which was really very sincere in spite of her successful manner of concealing it, came to the fore and she, too, rejoiced. Of course she had to suggest, to keep in character, that Kent might have communicated with his family sooner if he only would have exerted himself, but Molly was too happy to get angry and only laughed.

“Aunt Clay can no more help her ways than a chestnut can its burr.” And then she remembered how as children they would take sticks and beat the chestnut burrs open and she wondered if a good beating administered on Aunt Clay might not help matters. She voiced this sentiment to her mother, who said:

“My dear Molly, Life has administered the beating on your Aunt Clay long ago. It is being childless that makes her so bitter. I know that and that is the reason I am so patient, at least, I try to be patient with her. Of course, she always asserts she is glad she has no children, that my children have been a never ending anxiety to me and she is glad she is spared a similar worry.”

“But, Mother, we are not a never-ending anxiety, are we?”

“Yes, my darling, but an anxiety I would not be without for all the wealth of the Indies. Aren’t you a little bit anxious all the time about your baby?”

“Why, yes, just a teensy weensy bit, but then I haven’t got used to her yet.”

“Well, when you get used to her, she will be just that much more precious.”

“But then I have just one, and you have seven.”

“Do you think you love her seven times as much as I love you, or Kent or Milly or any of them?”

“Oh, Mother, of course I don’t. I know you love all of us just as much as I love my little Mildred, only I just don’t see how you can.”

“Maybe you will have to have seven children to understand how I can, but when you realize what it means to have Mildred, maybe you can understand what it has meant always to poor Sister Sarah never to have had any children.”

“I suppose it is hard on her but, Mother dear, if she had had the seven and you had never had any, do you think for a minute you would have been as porcupinish and cactus-like in your attitude toward the world and especially toward Aunt Clay’s seven as she is toward yours? Never!”

Molly’s statement was not to be combatted, although Mrs. Brown was not sure what she would have been like without her seven anxieties; but Molly knew that she would have been the same lovely person, no matter how many or how few children she had had.

“I’m going to try to feel differently toward Aunt Clay,” she whispered into her baby’s ear, as she cuddled her up to her after the great rite of bathing her was completed that morning. “Just think what it must be never to hold your own baby like this! Poor Aunt Clay! No wonder she is hard and cold – but goodness me, I’m glad I did not draw her for a parent.” The baby looked up into her mother’s eyes with a gurgle and crow, as though she, too, were pleased that her Granny was as she was and not as Aunt Clay was.

“We are going to see Daddy soon, do you know that, honey baby?” And Molly clasped her rosy infant to her breast with a heart full of thanksgiving that now there was no dire reason for her remaining in Kentucky longer.

A farewell visit must be paid to Aunt Mary. The baby was dressed in one of her very best slips and Molly put on her new blue suit for the occasion, as she well knew how flattered the old woman was by such an attention.

“Well, bless Gawd, if here ain’t my Molly baby and the little Miss Milly all dressed up in they best bibantucker! I been a lyin’ here a dreamin’ you was all back in the carstle, that there apple tree what you youngsters done built a house up’n an’ Miss Milly done sent me to say you mus’ come an wash yo’ faceanhans fer dinner, jes’ lak she done a millium times, an’ who should be up in the tree with you an’ that there Kent but yo’ teacher an’ that there Judy gal.”

Molly laughed as she always did when Aunt Mary called Professor Edwin Green, her teacher.

“Yes, chile, they was up there with you an’ Kent up’n had the imprence to tell me to go tell his maw that he warn’t comin’ ter no dinner, ’cause he an’ that there Judy gal was a keepin’ house up the tree.” The old woman chuckled with delight at Kent’s “imprence.”

“I shouldn’t be astonished if they did go to housekeeping soon, Aunt Mary, but I don’t fancy it will be up a tree.”

“An’ what I done say all the time ’bout that there Kent not being drownded? When the niggers came a whining ’roun’ me a sayin’ he was sho’ daid ’cause they done had signs an’ omens, I say ter them I done had mo’ ter do with that there Kent than all of ’em put together an’ I lak ter know what they be havin’ omens ’bout him when I ain’t had none. If’n they was any omens a floatin’ ’roun’ they would a lit on me an’ not on that triflin’ Buck Jourdan. He say he dream er teeth an’ ’twas sho sign er death. I tell him mebbeso but ’twas mo’n likely he done overworked his teeth a eatin’ er my victuals, a settin’ ’roun’ here dayanight a strummin’ on his gittah, an’ what’s mo’ I done tole him he better git the blacksmith ter pull out one er his jaw teeth what ain’t mo’n a snaggle. Sukey low she goin’ ter send him in ter Lou’ville ter one er these here tooth dentists, but I say the blacksmith is jes’ as good a han’ at drawin’ teeth as they is, an’ he chawge the same as ter shoe a mule, an’ that ain’t much.”

“But Aunt Mary, I should think if there is anything serious the matter with Buck’s teeth he had better see a dentist. The blacksmith might break his tooth off.”

“Who? This here blacksmith? Lawsamussy, honey, why he’s that strong an’ survigorous that he would bust Buck’s jaw long befo’ he break his tooth. He’ll grab hol’ the tooth and put his knee in Buck’s chist an’ he gonter hol’ on till either Buck or the tooth comes.”

A groan from the next room, the lean-to kitchen, gave evidence that Buck was in there, an unwilling eavesdropper since the method of the blacksmith on his suffering molar was the topic.

“Don’t you think the baby has grown, Aunt Mary?” asked Molly, mercifully changing the subject.

“Yes, she done growed some an’ she done growed prettier. I seed all the time she were gonter be pretty, an’ when that there Paul came down here an’ give it to me that the new baby looked lak a pink mummy – I done tol’ him that I didn’t know what a mummy were, but what ever it were, the new baby didn’t look no mo’ lak one than he did when he was born, ’cause of all the wrinkly, scarlet little Injuns he would a fetched the cake. That done dried that there Paul up an he ain’t been so bombast since bout the looks er no new babies.” The old woman chuckled with delight in remembrance of her repartee.

“Aunt Mary, I think you are feeling better, aren’t you? You seem much more lively than when I saw you last.”

“’Cose I is feelin’ better. Ain’t we done heard good news from that there Kent?”

“But I thought you knew all the time he was all right.”

“Well now, so I did, so fur as I knew anything, but they was times when I doubted, an’ those times pulled me back right smart. Why, honey, I used ter pray the Almighty if he lacked a soul ter jes’ tak me. I is a no ’count ole nigger on the outside but mebbe my soul is some good yit. If I could give up my life fur one er Miss Milly’s chillun, I’d be proud ter do it!”

“Oh, Aunt Mary, you have been so good to us always!”

“Lawsamussy, chile! What I here fur but ter be good ter my white folks? They’s been good ter me – as good as gole. I ain’t never wanted fur nothin’ an’ I ain’t never had a hard word from Carmichael or Brown, savin’, of cose, Miss Sary. She is spoke some hard words in her day, but she didn’ never mean nothin’ by them words. I don’t bear no grudge against po’ Miss Sary. The good Lord done made her a leetle awry an’ ’tain’t fur me ter be the one ter try to straighten her out. Sometimes whin I lies here a thinkin’ it seems ter me mebbe some folks is made lak Miss Sary jes’ so they kin be angels on earth like yo’ maw. Miss Sary done sanctified yo’ maw. She done tried her an’ rubbed aginst her, burnt her in de fire of renunciation and drinched her in the waters of reproachment until yo maw is come out refimed gold.”

“Maybe you are right, Aunt Mary. I am trying to be nicer about the way I feel about Aunt Clay myself. I think if I feel differently, maybe Aunt Clay would feel differently toward me. She does not like me, and why should she, since I don’t really like her?”

“I don’t want ter take no Christian thoughts from yo’ min’ an’ heart, honey chile, but the good you’ll git from thinkin’ kin’ things ’bout Miss Sary will be all yo’ own good. Miss Sary ain’t gonter be no diffrent. She done got too sot in her ways. The leper ain’t gonter change his spots now no mo’n it did in the time er Noah, certainly no ole tough leper lak Miss Sary.”

It was hard to tell the old woman good-by. Every time Molly left Chatsworth she feared it would be the last farewell to poor old Aunt Mary. She had been bedridden now for many months, but she hung on to life with a tenacity that was astonishing.

“Cose, I is ready ter go whin the Marster calls,” she would say, “but I ain’t a hurryin’ of him. A creakin’ do’ hangs long on its hinges an’ the white folks done iled up my hinges so, what with good victuals with plenty er suption in ’em an’ a little dram now an’ then ’cordin’ ter the doctor’s subscription, that sometimes I don’t creak at all. I may git up out’n this here baid ’fo long an’ be as spry as the nex’. I wouldn’t min’ goin’ so much if I jes’ had mo’ idee what Heaven is lak. I’m so feard it will be strange ter me. I don’t want ter walk on no goldin’ streets. Gold ain’t no better ter walk on than bricks. Miss Milly done read me the Psalm what say: ‘He maketh me to lay down in the green pastures.’ Now that there piece sounds mighty pretty – jes’ lak singin’, but I ain’t never been no han’ to set on the damp groun’ an’ Heaven or no Heaven, I low it would give me a misery ter be a doin’ it now; an’ as fer layin’ on it, no’m! I wants a good rockin’ cheer, an’ I wants it in the house, an’ when I wants ter res’ myse’f, a baid is good enough fer me.”

The old woman’s theology was a knotty problem for all of the Brown family. They would read to her from the Bible and reason with her, but her preconceived notion of Heaven was too much for them. She believed firmly in the pearly gates and the golden streets, and freely announced she would rather have her own cabin duplicated on the other side than all the many mansions, and her own whitewashed gate with hinges made from the soles of old shoes than the pearly gates.

“What I want with a mansion? The cabin whar I been a livin’ all my life is plenty good enough for this old nigger. An’ what’s mo, blue grass a growin’ on each side of a shady lane is better’n golden streets. I ain’t a goin’ ter be hard-headed bout Heaven, but I hope the Marster will let me settle in some cottage an’ let it be in the country where I kin raise a few chickens an’ mebbe keep a houndog.”

“I am sure the Master will let you have whatever you want, dear Aunt Mary,” Molly would say.

“But if’n he does that, I’ll get too rotten spiled ter stay in Heaven. He better limit me some, or I’ll feel too proudified even fer a angel.”

CHAPTER XV.

WELLINGTON AGAIN

“Oh, it is nice to be back home,” sighed Molly, settling herself luxuriously in the sleepy-hollow chair that was supposed to be set aside for the master of the house. With the girlish habit she had never outgrown, she slipped off her pumps and stretched out her slender feet to the wood fire, that felt very comfortable in the crisp autumn weather.

“That’s what you said when we arrived in Kentucky in the spring,” teased her husband.

“Well, so it was nice. The migratory birds have two homes and they are always glad to get to whichever one is seasonable. I reckon I am with my two homes as Mother is with her seven children. I love them just the same. Thank goodness, I haven’t seven of them, homes, I mean.”

“Yes, I think two are enough.”

“Which home do you love best, Wellington or the Orchard Home?” asked Molly, smiling fondly at her husband, who was dandling little Mildred on his knees with awkward eagerness.

“Why, neither one of them is home to me unless you are there, and whichever one you grace with your presence is for the time being the one I like the better.”

“And the baby, too, whichever one she is in makes it home!”

“Oh, certainly!” exclaimed Edwin Green with a whimsical expression on his face. “I see that when I make love now it is to be to two ladies and not to one.”

“Don’t you think Mildred has grown a lot? And see, her eyes have really turned brown, just as Mother said they would. Don’t you think she looks well?”

“Yes, honey, I think she looks very well, but I don’t think you do.”

“Me! Nonsense! I am as well as can be, just a little tired from the trip.”

“Yes, I know. Of course that was fatiguing, but I think you are thinner than you have any right to be. I am afraid you have been doing too much.”

“Oh, not at all. I have had simply nothing to do but take care of the baby, and that is just play, real play.”

“Humph, no doubt! But maybe you have played too hard and that is what has tired you. I thought you were going to bring Kizzie along to nurse.”

“Oh, that was your and Mother’s plan! I never had any idea of doing it. ’Deed and um’s muvver is going to take care of ’ittle bits a baby herself,” and Molly reached out and snuggled the willing Mildred down in the sleepy-hollow chair. Daddy’s knee was not the most comfortable spot in the world, and a back that has only been in the world about four months cannot stand for much dandling.

“But, Molly darling, Kizzie is a good girl and it would help you ever so much to have her. You know we can well afford it now, so don’t let the financial side of it worry you.”

“But, Edwin, I can’t give up taking care of the baby. I just love to do it.”

“All right, my dear, but please don’t wear yourself out.”

The fact was that the long strain of waiting for news from Kent had told on Molly, and she was looking quite wan and tired. It was not just the trip from Kentucky, which, of course, was no easy matter. Twenty-four hours on the train with an infant that needed much attention and got much more than it really needed was no joke, but the long hours and days of waiting and uncertainty had taken Molly’s strength. She did feel tired and had no appetite, but she felt sure a night’s rest would restore her. She rather attributed her lack of appetite to the poor food that the new Irish maid, whom Edwin had installed in her absence, was serving.

“I’ll take hold of her to-morrow and see what can be done,” she said rather wearily to herself. “I wish Mother could train her for me. I should much rather do the cooking myself than try to train some one who is as hopelessly green as this girl.”

That night little Mildred decided was a good time to assert herself. The trip had not tired her at all; on the contrary, it had spurred her on to a state of hilarity, which was very amusing at first but as the night wore on, ceased to be funny. She had come to the delightful knowledge of the fact that she had feet and that each foot had five toes. The cover did not stay on these little pigs one moment. Every time Molly would settle her tired bones and begin to doze, there would be a crow from Mildred, a gurgle, and straight in the air would go the bed clothes, tucked in for the millionth time by the patient young mother. Then the pink tootsies would leap into sight and soon find their way to a determined little mouth.

“Darling, you must go to sleepsumby!” Molly would remonstrate. “And you will catch your death if you don’t keep covered up!”

But the four months’ old baby had been too busy in her short life learning other things to bother her head about a mere language. The business of the night was feet and feet alone. There was too much to do about those wonderful little feet for her to think of sleep. Finally Molly gave up. She closed the windows, as too much fresh air on bare feet and legs might not be best and already the little limbs were icy cold. Then she kindled a fire in the grate, the furnace not yet having been started, and gave herself up to a night of sleeplessness. Early in the action, Edwin had been banished to the guest chamber, as he must get sleep no matter what happened, for he had a busy day ahead of him.

Toward morning little Mildred mastered her pedagogy, as her father had called it, and then she dropped off into a deep and peaceful sleep. The weary Molly slept, too.

Before he went to his lectures, Edwin crept into the room to look at his sleeping treasures. The chubby baby still had a toe clasped in her hand but from very weariness had fallen over on her side and was covered up all but the pink foot, which was asserting itself in the remarkable position that only the young can take. Molly looked very pale and tired but was sleeping peacefully. Edwin smiled at them. He had given the green maid from the Emerald Isle strict orders not to awaken them. He devoutly hoped that Molly would not know what a very mean breakfast he had endeavored to choke down; burnt bacon and underdone biscuit washed down with very weak coffee and flanked by eggs that had been cooked too long and not long enough, thereby undergoing that process that the chemist tells us is of all things the most indigestible: half hard and half soft. The burnt bacon had been cold and the underdone biscuit still cooking, seemingly, when the poor young husband and father had tried to nourish himself on them.