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Janice and her aunt made the curtains themselves, and they put them up so as to keep out the prying eyes of all Poketown, for the community now began to wonder what was going on in the empty room next the drug store. As Walky had been bound to secrecy, too, the curious had no means of learning what was going on.
Dexter?" asked Mrs. Day puzzled. "Why, I been gittin' of it all over taown," groaned the expressman. "Sarves me right, I s'pose. I see the reedic'lous side o' most things that happen ter other folks an' they gotter right ter laff at me." "Why, what's happened ye?" asked Aunt 'Mira. "Jefers-pelters!" ejaculated Walky. "Ain't Janice tol' ye?" "Nothin' about you," Mrs. Day assured him.
At sugaring time each year they invited all the young folk Walky Dexter could pack into his party wagon, to the camp not far from their house; and, as maple-sugar making was a new industry to Janice, she was not a little eager when she received her invitation from the two old ladies. The "sugaring" was on a Saturday, and the party met at the schoolhouse.
"Anyhow, I'm free ter confess that I don't see how I could ha' done sech a fullish thing if I hadn't been drinkin' it's a fac'! I never did b'lieve what little I took would ever hurt anybody. But poor ol' Josephus! He might ha' been drowned." "Oh, Walky!" cried Janice. "Do you see that?" "I see the light at last, Janice," solemnly said the expressman. "I guess I'd better let the stuff alone.
Janice was curious, and she yielded to the temptation of asking the town gossip a question: "Why why didn't Miss 'Rill marry Hopewell, then?" "The goodness only knows why they fell out, Miss Janice," declared Walky. "We none of us ever made out. I 'spect it was the old woman done it ol' Miz' Scattergood. She didn't take kindly to Hopewell.
Save at times when he had to deliver freight or express to the hotel, the village expressman had very little business to take him near Lem Parraday's bar nowadays. However, because of that secret between Janice and himself, Walky approached the Inn one evening with the avowed purpose of speaking to Joe Bodley.
Then, turning to her and grasping her hands firmly, he said: "Do you mean that, Janice?" "Yes. I mean just that," she said, rather flutteringly. "Oh! here comes a wagon. It must be Walky." "Never mind Walky," said Nelson, firmly. "I want to tell you that I sha'n't forget what you've said.
But the druggist paid the town humorist no attention. He hurried to the counter and leaned across it, asking his question for a second time. "Why, yes, she was here, Mr. Massey," said Hopewell, puzzled. "She changed a bill with you, didn't she?" "Jefers-pelters! was it counterfeit?" put in Walky, drawing nearer. "A twenty dollar bill yes, sir," said the storekeeper.
"You cannot be in earnest. Surely people do not say such dreadful things about Mr. Drugg?" "Fact. They got poor old Hopewell on the dissectin' table, and the way them wimmen cut him up is a caution to cats!" "What women, Walky?" "His blessed mother-in-law, for one. And most of the Ladies Aid is a-follerin' of her example. They air sayin' he's nex' door to a ditch drunkard."
In a week, although little Lottie's head was still bandaged, she was driven over to Middletown with Miss 'Rill, Walky Dexter being the driver, of course, and took a train for Boston. Before the day of departure Janice Day had a good deal to contend with. It did seem too bad that one could not spend one's own money without everybody trying to talk one out of it! Not every one, however!
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