Divided Skates

Master Lionel Towsley had not before felt any personal proprietorship in the big mansion; but he now ran lightly up its marble steps with a new and delightful sense of returning to his home. To his touch upon the door-bell nobody responded, and after several such demands had failed to awake any response, the reason for it came to him.

“Maybe they’ve gone. Maybe they won’t answer it. I’ll run down to the basement entry and try that.”

So the reporter waited while the lad did so, and presently there came a sound of eager feet within the front hall, and the door was flung wide. It was Towsley, of course, and his face was flushed with excitement and indignation, as he exclaimed:

“Come right straight in. Quick’s you can. She’s had a terrible time, I guess, and they’ve done it!”

All that was clear to the reporter’s mind of this announcement was that he was desired to enter and follow his guide; which he did into the cheerful basement breakfast-room, where Miss Armacost still sat. She had not gone upstairs since first coming down that morning, and she was white and tremulous. The sight of her troubled face aroused not only all Towsley’s chivalry, but that of the reporter also. Instantly, he regretted that he had so promptly availed himself of the newsboy’s “ghost story,” and had thought more of furnishing “copy” than of a gentlewoman’s feelings.

“For she’s not the sort will like to have her private experiences made public gossip,” he reflected, ruefully. Also, that it was probably too late, even now, to remedy the evil of his haste. The best course left him was to apologize for his presence and offer his assistance in a case of need.

But, for once, Miss Lucy was too much disturbed to care about notoriety, and she eagerly accepted his offer of help.

“It’s very silly of me. I see and know it perfectly; but this inexplicable ringing has so infected my people that all, except Jefferson, have gone away. Each made a plausible errand, for the moment, yet each declared her intention of leaving for good and right away. As for Jefferson, he claims to be unusually busy at the stable, and only appears – even that very reluctantly – when I ring him up. I’m not much used to doing my own errands, but Lionel’s suggestion seems a good one. If I could get hold of an electrician, that dreadful bell might be made to keep still.”

“Well, madam, I am not much of an electrician, but I do understand a little about such matters. If you’ll allow me to examine your wires I may discover the difficulty. Meanwhile, if you wish, I’ll step to the nearest drug store and telephone our own man, who attends to the building in which we are.”

The color returned to Miss Lucy’s face and the courage to her voice.

“Oh! if you will be so good! It would be a great favor to me. My life runs so smoothly, in ordinary, that I find myself upset by the unusual circumstances of the last few days. The blizzard, Sir Christopher’s death, Lionel’s coming and terrible experience in the storm, and now this extraordinary ringing of my door-bell, which even the neighbors have heard and are inquiring about – altogether I – I am quite unstrung.”

Again the reporter thought regretfully of the item which would appear in that evening’s paper, and earnestly hoped she would not see it. He determined to caution Towsley to keep her from doing so, if possible; so he walked to the nearest drug store, rang up the electrician, returned to the house, and proceeded to do a little investigating on his own account.

Just then Molly arrived, for in her loneliness at the desertion of her “girls” Miss Lucy had sent Jefferson to ask her presence. She had come as soon as possible, which had not, however, been very promptly, because it was market morning for her mother, and a few of the to-be-expected accidents had befallen the twins.

“You see, Miss Armacost,” said Molly, in explanation, “I was just whisking down the kitchen to make all tidy for mother, and had put Ivanora on one side the table and Idelia on the other. I gave Idelia a bag of buttons to play with, and because Ivanora hadn’t eaten much breakfast I gave her a dish of molasses and some bread. I knew, of course, she’d mess herself, but I thought it would keep her contented. And it did!” she cried, going off into such a peal of laughter that the reporter had to join.

“What’d she do, Molly?” asked Lionel.

“Why, I happened to set her alongside of father’s chair. That has a feather cushion in it and I didn’t know there was a hole in its cover. But there was, and Ivanora found it. I would have known she’d do that if I’d suspected the hole. When I turned around to see if all was right – my sake! There was that precious child all stuck up with feathers till she looked like some big bird. The molasses on her hands had made them stick as tight as burrs. They were all over her curls, her face, her clothes – everything! Well! When I’d done laughing so I could, I took her straight to the bath-tub and put her in, clothes and all. It seemed the easiest way to keep other things clean. Of course, I had to dress her all over again; and when I got back to see to Idelia – she was in a state, too! She had her mouth full of buttons, and I don’t know how many she’d swallowed. I really don’t. She was tasting them to see if they were candy. There was a small cork in the bag, and I declare! if that child hadn’t put that up her nose! Such mischiefs! Over two years old, and ought to know better!

“So, that’s what kept me, Miss Armacost. I couldn’t leave things in such a fix for mother, so I stayed till I’d helped get everything right. Mother has so much to do, always.”

“I should think so, indeed. Your excuse is most reasonable and does you credit.”

The reporter had listened to the girl’s story, but hastened below stairs to examine the electric arrangements of the house. He could make no helpful discoveries, however, and presently returned to the breakfast-room and the company of the others.

His presence in the house had, however, quite restored Miss Lucy to a normal condition of mind, for he had treated the curious bell-ringing as a trivial matter, easily explainable by the expert he had summoned, if not by himself; and he found the trio discussing the proposed sleigh-ride that Miss Lucy wanted to give the friends of her new charge.

“A sleigh-ride! For all the newsboys in town! Hurrah!” he cried, entering into the spirit of the thing as if he were a boy himself. “My dear Miss Armacost, you couldn’t do anything that would give so much pleasure. Think what such a treat means in this city! and fancy the sparkling eyes of the little chaps! What can I do to help?”

“Plenty of things, if you have leisure and inclination.”

“I certainly have the inclination, and I’ll make the leisure.”

“How many are there to go?”

The gentleman produced the ever-ready pad and pencil, and aided by Lionel’s suggestions made a list. It was a pretty big list, and Miss Lucy wondered if suitable vehicles could be obtained.

“Surely. Only it should be settled at once. Others besides us will be thinking of big sleighing parties. Moreover, if this sunshine holds the snow will not last long. When would you like to give the ride?”

“When would be best?”

“This afternoon,” broke in Lionel eagerly, and his friend the reporter nodded.

“So soon? Could it be arranged?”

“Yes, indeed. Easily – if at all.”

The lady laughed. “You newspaper people take my breath away with your promptness. I’m so used to thinking things over a long while. But I like it, I like it. I feel waked up by it.”

“We newspaper folk don’t have much time to ‘think over’ anything, do we, Tows?” asked the gentleman of his fellow-laborer; and the lad flushed with delight at this gay acceptance of himself into the “force.”

“No. Say, Miss Lucy, while we’re waiting for that man, couldn’t I run down to the store and telephone for the sleighs?”

“You? You – you, child? Could you do that?”

“Of course. Why not?”

“You – are so young.”

“Oh, I’ve been around!” said the newsboy, airily.

“I’ll do it myself, Tows. I think Miss Armacost would be better satisfied, and I’d be surer myself,” interrupted the reporter. “You see, lad, it’s her picnic.”

“O – oh! I thought it was ours.”

“So it is. Belongs to all of us.”

The gentleman hurried away; and the moment he did so the bell began again to ring. Towsley, and even Molly, looked frightened, but Miss Lucy was now able to laugh at the incident; and when Molly asked, earnestly:

“Do you suppose it could be a ghost, after all?” she replied indignantly:

“No, indeed. But what the gentleman said has reminded me of something else. It must be a ‘picnic,’ after all. It wouldn’t do to take those hungry lads for a ride in the sharp air and then give them nothing to eat afterward. They will have to be fed. We will have to hunt up a caterer and hire a hall, I suppose, and – ”

Miss Armacost’s face expressed the fact that she was undertaking a vast enterprise, and was rather frightened now by her own temerity.

“Oh! I’ll tell you!” cried Molly eagerly.

“Tell what, child?”

“The boarding-house woman! She’s the checker!”

“The what?”

“She’s the one to feed them! Oh! please! It would be so splendid for her, She’s so poor, and has such trouble to pay rent and keep going. She is too generous for her own good, father says, and keeps her house too well. She would cook for them and they could eat in her big dining-room. There’d be plenty of room, for she takes ‘mealers’ extra. Oh! if you say so I’ll run and call her over. Do you?”

Miss Armacost felt, for one brief moment, as if she were being turned out of her own abode. When she decided to adopt Towsley, she did not decide to open her doors to the whole of Side Street, or even Newspaper Square. Yet here she was, she – the aristocratic Lucy Armacost, who had hitherto associated with nobody whose pedigree could not match her own for length and distinction – here was she, consorting with newsboys, reporters, daughters of plumbers, boarding-house women, and what not! What was worse, according to her past ideas, she had never felt so interested, so warm and comfortable in her heart, in short so human as she did now. So, after that brief interval of reflection, she turned toward the bright-eyed Molly and nodded gayly: