Susan Clegg and a Man in the House Part 4

"Mrs. Macy says it's all most upsettin'. She says she never lived through nothin' like it afore. Judy's cross 'cause she can't go out an'

meet Busby without runnin' the risk of meetin' Mr. Drake an' losin' all the time she's put in so far bein' deserted. An' then there's a many things as a outsider never would know about or even guess at unless they've lived right in the house with a real live divorce. Mrs. Macy says as Martha Hack, as does the was.h.i.+n' for 'em all, is forever forgettin' an' sendin' Judy's wash home with Mr. Drake's just as if they was still completely married. That would n't be so bad only Mr. Drake waits for Solomon to get 'em Sunday, an' Solomon's kind-hearted an'

gives 'em to Busby so as to give him a excuse to make two calls in one day. Well, Mrs. Macy says the come out of it all is as when Judy wants to take a bath just about all Meadville has to turn out to see where under heaven her clean clothes is.

"I tell you, Mrs. Lathrop, tellin' it all to you does n't matter so much, but to hear Mrs. Macy tell it makes you wonder if it's worth while to try an' leave a man as you can't live with. Seems to me it'd be easier to live with him. Mrs. Macy says as she met Mr. Drake several times herself on his bicycle an' he looked most bloomin'. No one need be sorry for him, an' not many is sorry for Judy. But Mrs. Macy says there's only one person as all Meadville's sorry for, an' that's Busby Bell."

Mrs. Lathrop started to speak.

"Yes," Susan went on hurriedly. "Elijah said just that same thing the other day when he was talkin' about the Marlboroughs. He thinks as divorces is all a mistake, but then you're a widow an' Elijah ain't married so you're both pretty safe in airin' your views."

Susan rose just here and descended the steps. "I must go," she said, "I don't seem to take no particular interest in what you might be goin' to tell me, Mrs. Lathrop, even if there was any chance of your ever gettin'

around to tellin' it, an' I've told you all I know, an' I'm very tired talkin'. As I said before, it's been a full day an' I'm pretty well beat out. I forgot to tell you as after Mrs. Macy was gone I found as it was n't the bread I smelt in the oven--it was the bat. I suppose when I see Mr. Kimball he'll make one of his jokes over bread-dough an' bats an'

batter, but I'll be too wore out to care. Did I say as Elijah said he'd sleep at the store to-night?"

"Will--" cried Mrs. Lathrop, all of a sudden.

"Why, of course," said Susan, "it did n't hurt either loaf a mite. I'd be as much of a fool as Jerusha Dodd if I let a little thing like a bat spoil a whole bakin' of bread for me, Mrs. Lathrop. As for Elijah, he did n't know nothin' about it an' I sha'n't tell him, you may be sure, for he's the one as eats all the bread--I never touch it myself, as you well know."

CHAPTER VI

THE EDITOR'S ADVICE COLUMN

"I'm a good deal worried over Elijah," Miss Clegg said to Mrs. Lathrop, one day when the new paper was about three weeks old, and when the town had begun to take both it and its editor with reasonable calm; "he does have so many ideas. Some of his ideas are all right as far as I can see, but he has 'em so thick an' fast that it worries me more'n a little. It ain't natural to have new ideas all the time an' no one in this community ever does it. He's forever tellin' me of some new way he's thought of for branchin' out somewhere an' his branches make me more'n a little nervous. The old ways is good enough for us an' I try to hold him down to that idea, but first he wants me to get a new kind of flatirons as takes off while you heat it, an' next he wants me to fix the paper all over new.

"I brought over somethin' as he wrote last night to read you, an' show you how curious his brains do mix up things. He brought it down this mornin' an' read it to me, an' I asked him to give it to me to read to you. I was goin' to bring it to you anyway, but then he said as I could too, so it's all right either way. It's some of his new ideas an' he said he'd be nothin' but glad to have you hear 'em 'cause he says the more he lives with me the more respect he's got for your hearin' an'

judgment. He asked me what I thought of it first, an' I told him frank an' open as I did n't know what under the sun to think of it. I meant that, too, for I certainly never heard nothin' like it in my life afore, so he said we could both read it to-day an' I could tell him what we thought to-night, when he come home.

"Wh--" asked Mrs. Lathrop, with real interest.

"Well, seems he's been thinkin' as it's time to begin to show us how up-to-date he looks on life, he says, an' as a consequence he's openin'

up what he calls the field of the future. He says he's goin' to have a editorial this week on beginnin' from now on to make every issue of the _Megaphone_ just twice as good as the one afore. I told him if he really meant what he said it could n't possibly be worth no dollar a year now, but he said wait an' see an' time would tell an' virtue be her own reward. He says he's goin' to make arrangements with a woman in the city for a beauty column, an' arrangements with some other woman as is a practical preserver, an' have a piece each time on how to be your own dressmaker once you get cut out; I thought that these things was about enough for one paper, but oh my! he went on with a string more, as long as your arm. He's goin' to begin to have a advice column too, right off, an' that's this I've brought over to read you; he says lots of folks want advice an' don't want to tell no one nor pay nothin' an' they can all write him an' get their answers on anythin' in the wide world when the paper comes out Sat.u.r.day. I could n't but open my eyes a little at that, for I know a many as need advice as I should n't consider Elijah knew enough to give, but Elijah's a man an' in consequence don't know anythin' about how little he does know, so I did n't say nothin'

more on that subject. He's full of hope an' says he's soon goin' to show big city papers what genius can do single-handed with a second-hand printin' press, an' he talked an' talked till I really had to tell him that if he did n't want his breakfast he'd have to go back to bed or else down town."

"Is the--" asked Mrs. Lathrop.

"Yes, this is it. He done it last night an' he give it to me this mornin' to read to you. It's to be called 'The Advice Column' an' he's goin' to head it 'Come to My Bosom' an' sign it 'Aunt Abby' 'cause of course if he signed it himself he'd be liable for breach of promise from any girl as read the headin' an' chose to think he meant her."

"But who--?" began Mrs. Lathrop.

"Why, n.o.body the first week, of course. He had to make 'em up himself--an' the answers too, an' that's what makes it all seem so silly to me. But he did work over it,--he says no one knows the work of gettin' people stirred up to enthusiasm in a small town like this, an'

he says he'd ought to have a martyr's crown of thorns, he thinks, for even thinkin' of gettin' a advice column started when most of his energies is still got to go tryin' to get our fund for the famine big enough to make it pay to register the letter when the cheque goes. He says the trouble with the fund is no one has no relations there an' a good many thought as it was mostly Chinamen as is starvin' anyhow.

Elijah says the world is most dreadful hard-hearted about Chinamen--they don't seem to consider them as of any use a _tall_. He says it's mighty hard to get up a interest in anythin' here anyhow, Lord knows--for he says that San Francisco fund an' what become of it has certainly been a pill an' no mistake. The nearest he come to that was gettin' a letter as Phoebe White wrote the deacon about how the government relief train run right through the town she's in, but Elijah says after all his efforts he has n't swelled the famine fund thirty-five cents this week. He says Clightville has give nine dollars an' Meadville has give fifteen dollars an' two barrels an' a mattress, if anybody wants it C. O. D., an' here we are stuck hard at six dollars an' a quarter an' two pennies as the minister's twins brought just after they choked on them licorish marbles."

"Did--" asked Mrs. Lathrop.

"No, I did n't. I tell you what, Mrs. Lathrop, I keep a learnin'; in regard to givin' to funds I've learned a very good trick from Rockefeller an' Carnegie in the papers; they come to me about that San Francisco one an' I said right out frank an' open that if the town would give five hundred dollars I'd give fifty. That shut up every one's mouth an' set every one to thinkin' how much I was willin' to give an' as a matter of fact I did n't give nothin' a _tall_."

"But about--" said Mrs. Lathrop.

"Yes," said Susan, opening the paper which she had in her hand, "I was just thinkin' of it, too. I'll read it to you right off now an' you see if you don't think about as I do. I think myself as Elijah's made some pretty close cuts at people, only of course every one will guess as he must of made 'em up 'cause they don't really fit to no one. Still, it's a risky business an' I wish he'd let it alone for he lives in my house an' I know lots of folks as is mean enough to say that these things was like enough said to him by me--a view as is far from likely to make my friends any more friendly."

"Do--" said Mrs. Lathrop.

"Yes, I'm goin' to." Then Miss Clegg drew a long breath and re-began thus:

"Well, now, the first is, 'How can you put pickles up so they'll keep the year 'round?'" She paused there and looked expectantly at the placid Mrs. Lathrop as if she was asking a riddle or conducting an examination for the benefit of her friend. Mrs. Lathrop, however, had turned and was looking the other way so it was only when the length of the pause brought her to herself with a violent start, that she answered:

"My heavens ali--"

"The answer is," said Susan promptly, "'Put 'em up so high that n.o.body can reach them.'"

Mrs. Lathrop opened her eyes.

"I don't--" she protested.

"No, I did n't think as it was very sensible myself," responded Susan, "but do you know, Elijah laughed out loud over it. That's what's funny about Elijah to my order of thinkin'--he's so amused at himself. He thinks that's one of the best things he's done as a editor, he says, an'

I'm sure I can't see nothin' funny in it any more than you can. An' you don't see nothin' funny in it, do you?"

"No," said Mrs. Lathrop, "I--"

"Nor me neither," said Susan, "an' now the next one is sillier yet, to my order of thinkin'. It's a letter an' begins, 'Dear Aunt Abby;' then it says, 'Do you think it is possible to be happy with a young man with freckles? My husband says Yes, but my mother says No. He's my husband's son by his first wife. I have twins myself. I want the boy sent to a home of some sort. What do you think? Yours affectionately--Ada.'"

"What under the--" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Mrs. Lathrop.

"Just what I said," said Susan. "I could n't make head or tail out of it myself an' I'm afraid it'll make Deacon White mad 'cause Polly's his second wife--yes, an' the minister's got two wives, too. I tried to make Elijah see that but he just said to read the answer."

"What is--" asked Mrs. Lathrop.

"Oh, the answer's just as dumbfounderin' as the question, I think. The answer says, 'Hang on to the boy. If you get the twin habit he'll prove invaluable.'"

"Well, I--" said Mrs. Lathrop, disgustedly.

"I told Elijah that myself. I said that the minister was bound to feel hurt over the second wife part, but with twins in the answer he's sure to feel it means him an' I expect he'll maybe stop takin' the paper an'

join Mrs. Macy's club. Mrs. Macy got real mad at somethin' Mr. Kimball sold her last week an' as a consequence she went an' made what she calls her Newspaper Club, she rents her paper for a cent a day now an' she made four cents last week. She says if Elijah Doxey ever says anythin'

in the paper about her again she'll take three papers an' rent 'em at two mills a day an' supply the whole town an' wreck him so flat he'll have to hire out to pick hops. I told Elijah what she said an' he said for the Lord's sake to tell Mrs. Macy as her toes was hereafter perfectly safe from all his treads. I told her, but she says he need n't think quotin' from poets is goin' to inspire faith in him in her very soon again. She says over in Meadville it's town talk as Elijah Doxey is havin' just a box of monkeys' fun with us."

"Do you--" cried Mrs. Lathrop, open-eyed.

"No, I don't, for I asked him an' he crossed his heart to the contrary.

But really, Mrs. Lathrop, you must let me read the rest of this for I've got to be gettin' home to get supper."

"Go--" said the neighbor.

"No, I won't till I've done. The next one is this one an' it says, 'How long ought any one to wait to get married? I have waited several years an' there is nothin' against the man except he's eighty-two an'

paralyzed. I am seventy-nine. Pa an' Ma oppose the match an' are the oldest couple in the country,' an' Elijah has signed it 'Lovin'ly, Rosy'--of all the silly things!"