Dawn Eleanor Porter (free novels to read txt) 📖

John to read to Susan. Butbarely had she finished reading the letter aloud, when the real objectof her visit was disclosed by the triumphant:

"Well, Susan Betts, I notice even an artist has to come down to bein'a 'common storekeeper' sometimes."

Susan drew herself up haughtily.

"Of course, Mis' McGuire, 't ain't for me to pretense that I don'tknow what you're inferrin' to. But jest let me tell you this: it don'tmake no difference how many potatoes an' molasses jugs an' kerosenecans Daniel Burton hands over the counter he won't never be jest acommon storekeeper. He'll be THINKIN' flowers an' woods an' sunsetsjest the same. Furthermore an' moreover, in my opinion it's a veryhonorary an' praiseful thing for him to do, to go out in the hedgesan' byways an' earn money like that, when, if the world only knewenough to know a good thing when they see it, they'd be buy in' thempictures of his, an' not subjugate him to the mystification of earnin'his bread by the sweat of his forehead."

"Oh, good gracious me, Susan Betts, how you do run on, when you getstarted!" ejaculated Mrs. McGuire impatiently, yet laughingly. "An' Imight have known what you'd say, too, if I'd stopped to think. Well, Imust be goin', anyhow. I only came over to show you the letter from myJohn. I'm sure I wish't was him comin' back to his old place behindthe counter instead of your Daniel Burton," she sighed. "I'd buy everypicture he ever painted (if I had the money), if 't would only bringmy John back, away from all those awful bombs an' shells an' shrapnelthat he's always writin' about."

"Them be nice letters he writes, I'm free to confess," commented Susangraciously. "Not that they tell so much what he's doin', though; but Is'pose they're censured, anyhow—all them letters be."

Mrs. McGuire, her eyes dreamily fixed out the window, nodded her headslowly.

"Yes, I s'pose so; but there's a lot left—there's always a lot left.And everything he writes I can just see. It was always like that withmy John. Let him go downtown an' come back—you'd think he'd been tothe circus, the wonderful things he'd tell me he'd seen on the way.An' he'd set 'em out an' describe 'em until I could just see 'emmyself! I'll never forget. One day he went to a fire. The old Babcockhouse burned, an' he saw it. He was twelve years old. I was sick inbed, an' he told me about it. I can see him now, standin' at the footof the bed, his cheeks red, his eyes sparklin' an' his little handsflourishin' right an' left in his excitement. As he talked, I couldjust see that old house burn. I could hear the shouts of the men, theroar an' cracklin' of the flames, an' see 'em creepin', creepin',gainin', gainin'-! Oh, it was wonderful—an' there I was right in myown bed, all the time. It was just the way he told it. That's why Iknow he could have been a writer. He could make others see—everything. But now—that's all over now. He'll never be—anything. Ican see him. I can see all that horrible battle-field with the reelin'men, the flames, the smoke, the burstin' shells, an', oh, God—myJohn! Will he ever, ever come back—to me?"

"There, there, Mis' McGuire, I jest wouldn't—" But Mrs. McGuire, witha shake of her head, and her eyes half covered with her hand, turnedaway and stumbled out of the kitchen.

Susan, looking after her, drew a long sigh.

     "Worry never climbed a hill,

       Worry never—

There's some times when it's frank impertinence to tell folks not toworry," she muttered severely to herself, attacking the piled-updishes before her.

Daniel Burton went to work in McGuire's grocery store the nextmorning, after a particularly appetizing breakfast served to him by asilent, red-eyed, but very attentive Susan.

"An' 'twas for all the world like a lamb to the slaughter-house,"Susan moaned to the law-student lodger when she met him on the stairsat eight o'clock that morning. "An' if you want to see a realslaughter-house, you jest come in here," she beckoned him, leading theway to the studio.

"But—but—that is—well—" stammered the young fellow, looking not alittle startled as he followed her, with half-reluctant feet.

In the studio Susan flourished accusing arms.

"Look at that, an' that, an' that!" she cried. "Why, it's like jestany extraordinary common-sense room now, that anybody might have, withthem pictures all put away, an' his easel hid behind the door, an' nota brush or a cube of paint in sight—an' him dolin' out vinegar an'molasses down to that old store. I tell you it made me sick, Mr.Jenkins, sick!"

"Yes, yes, that's so," murmured Mr. Jenkins, vaguely.

"Well, it did. Why, it worked me up so I jest sat right down an' madeup a poem on it. I couldn't help it. An' it came easy, too—'most likethe spontaneous combustion kind that I used to write, only I made itfree verse. You know that's all the rage now. Like this," shefinished, producing from somewhere about her person a half-sheet ofnote-paper.

     "Alone an' dark

      The studio

      Waited:

      Waited for the sun of day.

      But when it rose,

      Alas!

      No lovely pictures greeted

      The fiery gob.

      Only their backs showed

      White an' sorry an' some dusty.

      No easel sprawled long legs

      To trip

      An' make you slip.

      No cubes of pig-lent gray

      Or black,

      Nor any other color lent brightness

      To this dank world.

      An' he—the artist? The bright soul who

      Bossed this ranch?

      Alas!

      Doomed to hide his bright talons

      In smelly kegs of kerosene

      An' molasses brown an' sticky.

      Alas, that I should see an'

      Know this

      Day.

There, now, ain't that about the way 'tis?" she demanded feelingly.

"Er—yes, yes, it is. That's so." Mr. Jenkins was backing out of theroom and looking toward the stairway. Mr. Jenkins had been a member ofthe Burton household long enough to have learned to take Susan at herown valuation, with no questions asked. "Yes, that's so," he repeated,as he plunged down the stairs.

To Daniel Burton himself Susan made no further protests or evencomments—except the silent comment of eager service with somefavorite