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Nelson Haley entered into the spirit of the affair and wrote down Janice's personal history to date, just as briefly and clearly as the girl gave it under the operator's questioning. Young Haley added a few notes of his own, which he explained in the operator's ear before the latter tapped out his message to New York.
Yet she could not blame Uncle Jason for his calm attitude in this event. It was his nature to be moderate and careful. She did not scold like Aunt 'Mira, nor mutter and glare like Marty. She could not, however, eat any dinner. It was nerve-racking to sit there, playing with her fork, awaiting Uncle Jason's pleasure. Janice's eyes were tearless.
"I beg you to give me a word apart, for I have a message to you from Colonel Brereton." Janice's hand dropped from the officer's arm. "What is it?" she asked. "'T is not to be given here," urged the man. "I pray you to let me order your equipage and take you away. Another dance will be beginning on the moment, and some one will claim you."
Watkins, isn't the small room beyond Janice's quite sufficient for you?" he asked, a little color coming into his face now. "Oh, my dear Mr. Day! I could not consider that for a moment. Why, that is the girl's room merely a bedroom for the hired help. I could not possibly consider myself in the same class " "Except on pay-day, Mrs. Watkins?" asked the man bluntly.
A much-bethumbed envelope, addressed in crooked "printed" characters to "Mis Janis Day, Pokton," enclosed in a teacher's letter to the storekeeper, was the cover of Janice's love letter. Inside, the child said: "Dear Janis, jus' to think, I can see reel good, and my techur what I luv says maybe I will heer reel good bymeby.
One of his dogs, an English spaniel, neither interested in Janice's caricature of Lee, nor in Lee's abuse of Washington, took advantage of his master's preoccupation to steal into the house, a proceeding which Clarion evidently resented, for suddenly from within came loud yaps and growls, which told only too plainly that if there was no protector of the household from the anger of the general, there was one who objected to the intrusion of his dog.
Janice feared that the poor little bride would discover the expression of her doubt in her eyes. 'Rill seemed to understand what was in Janice's mind and heart. She kept on with strained vehemence: "I know what they all say! And my mother is as bad as any of them. They say Hopewell was intoxicated. He was sick, and the bartender mixed him something to settle his stomach.
She must reach the seat of trouble before Olga got to the place! Otherwise, the trouble was bound to increase and become what? Even Janice's imagination, trained, as it was, by the succession of incompetent and unwilling kitchen helpers, could not picture that. Before Janice Day could reach the hall, Olga was padding down the stairs to the kitchen. From the rear arose increasing howls.
Janice came and kissed her oh, so tenderly! They stood above the sleeping child. 'Rill had eyes only for the half naked, plump limbs and body of the little girl, or she might have seen something in Janice's tearful glance to make her suspicious.
She insisted upon putting Janice's feet into a mustard-water bath, and made her swallow fully a pint of steaming hot "composition." Two hours later Janice was able to go to bed, and, because she hoped against hope, and was determined not to believe the story until it was thoroughly confirmed, she fell immediately into a dreamless sleep.
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