The Dorrance Domain Part 31

Grasping the situation, Leicester flung himself through the wicket door and behind the office desk. In a jiffy, he had a.s.sumed his clerkly air, and had opened the great register at the proper date.

When Dorothy appeared, a moment later, with Miss Dillingham, Leicester offered the pen to the newcomer with such a businesslike air that there seemed really no further room to doubt the responsibility of the hotel management. Then he rang a bell, and in a moment Mr. Hickox appeared, and with the deferential demeanor of a porter picked up Miss Dillingham's suit-case and stick.

Then Dorothy escorted the lady-tramp to her room, and returned a few moments later, to find the other children waiting for an explanation.

"Where did you catch it?" asked Leicester.

"What is it?" inquired Lilian.

"It's only for one night," explained Dorothy, laughing; "but, Less, she wants to run the hotel! She thinks we aren't responsible!"

It really seemed inevitable, so Lilian started the Dorrance groan. The others took it up, with their usual enthusiasm, and though it was of late a forbidden indulgence, they let themselves go for once, and the result was an unearthly din that brought grandma to the scene at once.

"Children!" she exclaimed. "You know you promised not to do that!"

"I know, grandma," explained Fairy, "but truly, this is a specialty occasion. You don't know what's happened, and what she wants to do."

But before Mrs. Dorrance could learn what had happened, the newly-registered guest herself, came flying down the staircase.

"What _is_ the matter?" she cried; "is the house on fire? Has anybody been killed?"

"We must 'pollergize, Miss Dillingham," spoke up Fairy; "that's our Dorrance groan, it belongs to the family; we don't use it much up here, 'cause it wakes up the baby and otherwise irritations the boarders."

"I should think it would," put in Miss Dillingham, with conviction.

"Yes, it does," went on Fairy, agreeably; "and so you see, we don't 'low ourselves to 'spress our feelings that way very often. But to-day we had a purtickular reason for it, and so somehow we found ourselves a-groaning before we knew it."

Ignoring Fairy and her voluble explanation, Miss Dillingham turned to Mrs. Dorrance, and inquired with dignity: "Are you the lady of the house?"

"I am the owner of the house," said Grandma Dorrance, with her own gentle dignity, "and my granddaughter Dorothy is in charge of it. I must ask you to forgive the disturbance the children just made, and I think I can safely a.s.sure you it will not happen again."

Grandma Dorrance looked at her grandchildren, with an air of confidence that was responded to by a look of loving loyalty from each pair of laughing young eyes.

"I don't understand it at all," said Miss Dillingham; "but I will now return to my room, and take a short nap, if the house can be kept quiet.

Then later, I have a proposition which I wish to lay before you, and which will doubtless prove advantageous to all concerned."

Miss Dillingham stalked majestically up the stairs again, and the Dorrances consulted as to what she could mean by her extraordinary proposition.

"I know," said Dorothy, "she wants to run the hotel. She informed me that she was much better qualified for such a business than I am."

"Oh, ho!" cried Leicester, "she is, is she! Well I like her nerve!"

"I wish she hadn't come," said Fairy, beginning to cry. "I don't want her to run this hotel, and Dorothy and all of us only be just boarders."

"Don't cry, Fairy, whatever you do," exclaimed Leicester. "If you put up one of your best crying-spells, it will make more noise than the groan did, and our new friend will come racing down-stairs again."

This suggestion silenced Fairy, and Leicester went on: "Do you really mean, Dot, that she proposed seriously to take charge of the Domain?"

"Yes, she did; and I think she expects to make a business proposition to that effect."

"All right, then; let's give her as good as she sends. Let's pretend that we entertain her proposition, and see what she has to say for herself."

"You'd better be careful," said Lilian, the practical, "sometimes people get caught in their own trap; and if you pretend you're going to let her have charge of affairs here, first thing you know she'll be at the head of things, and we will all be nowhere."

"Huh!" exclaimed Dorothy. "I'm not afraid of being dethroned by any lady-tramp that happens along. Just let her try it!"

"However she might frighten us singly," said Leicester, "I rather guess that the Dorrance family as a whole, can stand up for their rights."

"Don't be foolish, children," said grandma; "Dorothy must have misunderstood the lady. She couldn't have meant to make such a strange proposition at a moment's notice."

But apparently that is just what Miss Lucille Dillingham did mean. For that evening, after dinner, she gathered the Dorrance children round her in one of the small drawing-rooms, and talked to them in a straightforward if unacceptable way.

"Now don't say a word," she said, "until I have thoroughly explained my intention."

"We won't say a word, Miss Dillingham," said Fairy, "until you say your speech. But please say it plain, 'cause I'm the littlest one and sometimes I can't understand big words. 'Course I say big words myself, sometimes, but I understand my own, only other people's aren't always tellergibble to me. And so, you see I just have to----"

"That will do, Fairy," interrupted Leicester; "we've agreed not to do our talking until Miss Dillingham is through."

"In a few words, then," began Miss Dillingham, with the air of one who is satisfied of a foregone conclusion, "I want to say that in the few hours I have been here I have thoroughly acquainted myself with the conditions and possibilities of this hotel. And I have discovered that it is improperly managed by incompetent hands, and that it is, therefore, a lucky stroke of fortune for you that I happened along just now. I propose to a.s.sume entire charge of the hotel, give it a new name, establish new methods of management, and control absolutely the receipts and expenditures."

If the four Dorrances hadn't been possessed of a strong sense of humor, they would have been appalled by this extraordinary proposition. As it was, it struck them all as being very funny, and though with difficulty restraining a smile, Leicester inquired, with every appearance of serious interest, "And where do we come in?"

"You will be merely boarders," announced Miss Dillingham, "and can run and play as befits children of your ages. It may seem strange to you at first, that I should make you this generous proposition on so short an acquaintance, but it is my habit to make quick decisions, and I rarely regret them."

"Would you mind telling us your reasons for wanting to do this thing?"

asked Lilian.

"My reasons are perhaps too subtle for young minds to understand. They are partly ethical, for I cannot make it seem right that a girl of sixteen should be so weighted with responsibility; and, too, I am actuated in part by motives of personal advantage. I may say the project seems to possess a pecuniary interest for me----"

"Miss Dillingham," said Fairy fixing her wide-open eyes on the lady's face, "'scuse me for interrupting, but truly I can't understand all those words. What does etherkle mean? and what is terc.u.merary? They are nice words and I would like to save them to use myself, if I knew a little bit what they meant."

"Never mind what they mean, Fairy," said Leicester; "and Miss Dillingham, it is not necessary for us to consider this matter any further. You have made your proposition, and I am sure that I speak for the four of us, when I say that we decline it absolutely and without further discussion."

When Leicester chose, he could adopt a tone and manner that seemed far more like a man, than like a boy of his years; and Miss Dillingham suddenly realized that she was not dealing with quite such childish minds as she had supposed.

"My brother is quite right," said Dorothy, and she, too, put on her most grown-up manner, which, by the way, was very grown-up indeed. "Although surprised at what you have said, we understand clearly your offer, and we respectfully but very positively decline it _in toto_."

As Dorothy confessed afterwards, she didn't know exactly what _in toto_ meant, but she felt quite certain it came in appropriately just there.

Miss Dillingham seemed to think so too, or at any rate she was impressed by the att.i.tude of the Dorrance young people, and without a further word, she rose and stalked away and they saw her no more that night. The next morning she was up early and after a somewhat curt leave-taking, she tramped away.

"I think I could have liked her," said Dorothy, thoughtfully, "if she hadn't tried to steal away from us our Dorrance Domain."

CHAPTER XXIV