Aunt Corinne realizing it was a man, rushed to the top of the steps and hid her eyes behind the door. She knew her mother could deal with him, and, if he offered any harm, pour coals of fire upon his head in a literal sense. But she did not feel able to stand by. Robert, on the other hand, seeing no red nightcap on the head thrust up toward them, supported his grandmother strongly, and even helped to pull the man up-stairs.
One touch of his soft, foolish body was enough to convince any one that he was a harmless creature. His foot was sprained.
Robert carried a backless chair and set it before the fire, and on this the limping man was placed. Grandma Padgett emptied her coals on the hearth and surveyed him. He had a red face and bashful eyes, and while the top of his head was quite bald, he had a half-circle of fuzz extending around his face from ear to ear. He wore a roundabout and trousers, and shoes with copper toes. His hands were fat and dimpled as well as freckled. Altogether, he had the appearance of a hugely overgrown boy, ducking his head shyly while Grandma Padgett looked at him.
“For pity sake!” said Grandma Padgett. “What ails the creature? What's your name, and who are you?”
At that the man chanted off in a nasal sing-song, as if he were accustomed to repeating his rhyme:
J. D. Matthews is my name,
Ohio-r is my nation,
Mud Creek is my dwellin' place,
And glory is my expectation.
“Yes,” said Grandma Padgett, removing her glasses, as she did when very much puzzled.
Corinne, in a distant corner of the lighted room, began to laugh aloud, and after looking towards her, the man laughed also, as if they two were enjoying a joke upon the mother.
“Well, it may be funny, but you gave us enough of a scare with your gruntin' and your groanin',” said Grandma Padgett severely.
J. D. Matthews reminded of his recent tribulations, took up one of his feet and began to groan over it again. He was as shapeless and clumsy as a bear, and this motion seemed not unlike the tiltings of a bear forced to dance.
“There you go,” said Grandma Padgett. “Can't you tell how you came in the cellar, and what hurt you?”
Mr. Matthews piped out readily, as if he had packed the stanza into shape between the groans of his underground sojourn:
To the cellar for fuel I did go, And there I met my overthrow; I lost my footing and my candle, And grazed my shin and sprained my ankle.
“The man must be a poet,” pronounced Grandma Padgett with contempt. “He has to say everything in rhyme.”
Chanted Mr. Matthews:
I was not born in a good time, I cannot speak except in rhyme.
“Ain't he funny?” said Bobaday, rubbing his own knees with enjoyment.
“He's very daft,” said the grandmother. “And what to do for him I don't know. We've nothing to eat ourselves. I might wet his foot and tie it up.”
Mr. Matthews looked at her smilingly while he recited:
I have a cart that does contain A panaseer for ev'ry pain. There's coffee, also there is chee, Sugar and cakes, bread and hone-ee. I have parch corn and liniment, Which causes me to feel content. There is some half a dozen kittles To serve me when I cook my vittles. Butter and eggs I do deal in; To go without would be a sin. When I sit down to cook my meals, I know how good a king feels.
“Well, if you had your cart handy it would be worth while,” said Grandma Padgett indulgently. “But talkin' of such things when the children are hungry only aggravates a body more.”
Producing a key from his roundabout pocket, Mr. Matthews lifted his voice and actually sung:
J. D. Matthews' cart stands at your door.
Lady, will you step out and see my store?
I've cally-co and Irish table linen,
Domestic gingham and the best o' flannen.
I take eggs and butter for these treasures,
I never cheat, but give good measures.
“Let me see if there is a cart,” begged Bobaday, reaching for the key which his grandmother reluctantly received.
He then went to the front door and groped in the weeds. The hand-cart was there, and all of Mr. Matthews' statements were found to be true. He had plenty of provisions, as well as a small stock of dry goods and patent medicines, snugly packed in the vehicle which he was in the habit of pushing before him. There were even candles. Grandma Padgett lighted one, and stuck it in an empty liniment bottle. Then she dressed the silly pedler's ankle, and put an abundant supper on the fire to cook in his various kettles; the pedler smiling with pure joy all the time to find himself the centre of such a family party.
Bobaday and Corinne came up, and stood leaning against the ends of the mantel. No poached eggs and toast ever looked so nice; no honey ever had such melting yellow comb; no tea smelled so delicious; no ginger cakes had such a rich moistness. They sat on the carriage cushions and ate their supper with Grandma Padgett. It was placed on the side of an empty box, between them and the pedlerman. He divided his attention betwixt eating and chanting rhymes, interspersing both with furtive laughs, into which he tried to draw the children. Grandma Padgett overawed him; but he evidently felt on a level with aunt Corinne and her nephew. In his foolish red face there struggled a recollection of having gone fishing, or played marbles, or hunted wild flowers with these children or children like them. He nodded and twinkled his eyes at them, and they laughed at whatever he did. His ankle was so relieved by a magic liniment, that he felt able to hobble around the house when Grandma Padgett explored it, repeating under his breath the burst he indulged in when she arrayed the supper on the box:
O, I went to a friend's house,
The friend says, 'Come in,
Have a hot cup of coffee;
And how have you been?'
Grandma Padgett said she could not sleep until she knew what other creatures were hidden in the house.
They all ascended the enclosed staircase, and searched echoing dusty rooms where rats or mice whisked out of sight at their approach.
“This is a funny kind of an addition to a tavern,” remarked the head of the party. “No beds: no anything. We'll build a fire in this upper fireplace, and bring the cushions and shawls up, and see if we can get a wink of sleep. It ain't a cold night, and we're dry now. You can sleep by the fireplace down-stairs,” she said to the pedler, “and I'll settle with you for our breakfast and supper before we leave in the morning. It's been a providence that you were in the house.”
Mr. Matthews smiled deferentially, and appeared to be pondering a new rhyme about Grandma Padgett. But the subject was so weighty it kept him shaking his head.
They came down-stairs for fuel and coals, and she requested the pedler to take possession of the lower room and make himself comfortable, but not to set the house on fire.
“What shall we give him to sleep on?” pondered the grandmother. “I can't spare things from the children; it won't do to let him sleep on the floor.”
“I have a cart, it has been said,
Which serves me both for cupboard and bed,”
chanted Mr. Matthews.
“Well, that's a good thing,” said Grandma Padgett. “If you could pull a whole furnished house out of that cart 'twouldn't surprise me.”
The pedler opened the door and dragged his cart in over the low sill. They then bolted the door with such rusty fastenings as remained to it.
As soon as he felt the familiar handle on his palms, J. D. Matthews forgot that his ankle had been twisted. He was again upon the road, as free as the small wild creatures that whisked along the fence. Grandma Padgett's grown-up strength of mind failed to restrain him from acting the horse. He neighed, and rattled the cart wildly over the empty room. Now he ran away and pretended to kick everything to pieces; and now he put himself up at a manger, and ground his feed. He broke out of his stable and careened wildly around a pasture, refusing to be hitched, and expressing his contempt for the cart by kicking up at it.
“I guess your sprain wasn't as bad as you let on,” observed Grandma Padgett.
The observation, or a twinge, reminded Mr. Matthews to double himself down and groan again.
With painful limps, and Robert Day's assistance, he got the cart before the fireplace. It looked like a narrow, high green box on wheels. The pedler blocked the wheels behind, and propped the handle level. Then he crept with great contentment to the top, and stretched himself to sleep.
“He's a kind of a fowl of the air,” said Grandma Padgett.
“Oh, but I hope he's going our road!” said Bobaday, as they re-ascended the stairs. “He's more fun than a drove of turkeys!”
“And I'm not a bit afraid of him,” said aunt Corinne. “He ain't like the old man with a bag on his back.”
But J. D. Matthews was going in the opposite direction.
Before Grandma Padgett had completed her brief toilet next morning, and while the daylight was yet uncertain, the Dutch landlord knocked at the outer door for his fee. He seemed not at all surprised at finding the pedler lodging there, but told him to stop at the tavern and trade with the vrow.
“And a safe time the poor simple soul will have,” said Grandma Padgett, making her spectacles glitter at the landlord, “gettin' through the creek that nigh drowned us. I suppose, you have a ford that you don't keep for movers.”
“Oh, yah!” said the landlord. “Te fort ist goot.”
“How dared you send a woman and two children to such an empty, miserable shell as this?”
{Illustration: J. D. MATTHEWS RUNS AWAY.}
“I don't keep moofers to mine tafern,” said the landlord, putting his abundant charge into his pocket. “Chay-Te, he always stops here. He coes all ofer te countries, Chay-Te toes. His headt ist pat.”
“But his heart is good,” said the grandmother. “And that will count up more to his credit than if he was an extortioner, and ill-treated the stranger within his gate.”
“Oh, Chay-Te ist a goot feller!” said the Dutch landlord comfortably, untouched by any reflections on his own conduct.
Grandma Padgett could not feel placid in her mind until the weeds and hill hid him from sight.
Mr. Matthews arose so sound from his night's slumber, that he was able after pumping a prodigious lot of water over himself, and blowing with enjoyment, to help her get the breakfast, and put the kettles in travelling order afterwards. He had a great many housewifely ways, and his tidiness was a satisfaction to Grandma Padgett. The breakfast was excellent, but Corinne and Bobaday on one side of the box, and J. D. Matthews on the other, exchanged glances of regret at parting. He helped Robert put the horses to the carriage, making blunders at every stage of the hitching up.
They all came out of the Susan House, and he pushed his cart into the road.
“I almost hate to leave it,” said aunt Corinne, “because we did have a good time after we were scared so bad.”
“Seems as if a body always hates to leave a place,” remarked Bobaday. “The next people that come along will never know we lived here one night. But we'll always remember it.”
Grandma Padgett before entering the carriage, was trying to make the pedler take pay for the food her family ate. He smiled at her deferentially, but backed away with his cart.
“What a man this is!” she exclaimed impatiently. “We owe you for two meals' vittles.”
“I have some half a dozen kittles,” murmured Mr. Matthews.
“But won't you take the money? The landlord was keen enough for his.”
The pedler had got his rhyme about Grandma Padgett completed. He left her, still stretching her hand out, and rattled his cart up to the children who were leaning from the carriage towards him.
“She is a lady of renown,” chanted J. D. Matthews, indicating their grandmother.
She makes good butter by the pound, Her hand is kind, so is her tongue; But when she comes I want to run!
He accordingly ran, rattling the cart like a hailstorm before him, downhill; and out of their sight.
“Ah, there he goes!” sighed aunt Corinne, “and he hardly limps a bit. I hope we'll see him again some time.”
“I might 'a forced the money into his pocket,” reflected Grandma Padgett, as she took up the lines. “But I'd rather feel in debt to that kind, simple soul than to many another. Why didn't we ask him if he saw Zene's wagon up the road? These poor horses want oats. They'll be glad to sight the white cover once more.”
“I would almost rather have him come along,” decided Robert Day, “than to find the wagon. For he could make a camp anywhere, and speak his poetry all the time. What fun he must have if he wants to stay in the woods all night. I expect if he wanted to hide he could creep into that cart and stretch out, with his face where he could smell the honey and ginger cakes. I'd like to have a cart and travel like that. Are we going on to the 'pike again, Grandma?”
“Not till we find Zene,” she replied, driving resolutely forward on the strange road.
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