The Rejuvenation of Aunt Mary.

by Anne Warner.

CHAPTER ONE - INTRODUCING AUNT MARY

The first time that Jack was threatened with expulsion from college his Aunt Mary was much surprised and decidedly vexed-mainly at the college.

His family were less surprised, viewing the young man through a clearer atmosphere than his Aunt Mary ever had, and knowing that he had barely escaped similar experiences earlier in his career by invariably leaving school the day before the board of inquiry convened.

Jack"s preparatory days having been more or less tempestous, his family (Aunt Mary excepted) had expected some sort of after-clap when he entered college. Nevertheless, they had fervently hoped that it would not be quite as bad as this.

Jack"s sister Arethusa was visiting her aunt when the news came. Not because she wanted to, for the old lady was dreadfully deaf and fearfully arbitrary, but because Lucinda had said that she must go to her cousin"s wedding, and the family always had to bow to Lucinda"s mandates. Lucinda was Aunt Mary"s maid, but she had become so indispensable as a sitter at the off-end of the latter"s ear-trumpet that none of the grand-nephews or grand-nieces ever thought for an instant of crossing one of her wishes. So it was to Arethusa that the explanations due Aunt Mary"s interest in her scapegrace fell, and she bowed her back to the burden with the resignation which the circ.u.mstances demanded.

"Whatever is the difference between bein" expelled and bein" suspended?"

Aunt Mary demanded, in her tone of imperious impatience. "Well, why don"t you answer? I was brought up to speak when you"re spoken to, an" I"m a great believer in livin" up to your bringin" up-if you had a good one.

What"s the difference, an" which costs most? That"s what I want to know. I do wish you"d answer me, Arethusa; there"s two things I"ve asked you now, an" you suckin" your finger an" puttin" on your thimble as if you were sittin" alone in China."

"I don"t know which costs most," Arethusa shrieked.

"You needn"t scream so," said Aunt Mary. "I ain"t so hard to hear as you think. I ain"t but seventy, and I"ll beg you to remember _that_, Arethusa.

Besides, I don"t want to hear you talk. I just want to hear about Jack.

I"m askin" about his bein" expelled and suspended, an" what"s the difference, an" in particular if there"s anything to pay for broken gla.s.s.

It"s always broken gla.s.s! That boy"s bills for broken gla.s.s have been somethin" just awful these last two years. Well, why don"t you answer?"

"I don"t know what to answer," Arethusa screamed.

"What do you suppose he"s done, anyhow?"

"Something bad."

Aunt Mary frowned.

"I ain"t mad," she said sharply. "What made you think I was mad? I ain"t mad at all! I"m just askin" what"s the difference between bein" expelled an" bein" suspended, an" it seems to me this is the third time I"ve asked it. Seems to me it is."

Arethusa laid down her work, drew a mighty breath, very nearly got into the ear-trumpet, and explained that being suspended was infinitely less heinous than being expelled, and decidedly less final.

Aunt Mary looked relieved.

"Oh, then he"s gettin" better, is he?" she said. "Well, I"m sure that"s some comfort."

And then there was a long pause, during which she appeared to be engaged in deep reflection, and her niece continued her embroidery in peace. The pause endured until a sudden sneeze on the part of the old lady set the wheels of conversation turning again.

"Arethusa," she said, "I wish you"d go an" get the ink an" write to Mr.

Stebbins. I want him to begin to look up another college with good references right away. I don"t want to waste any of the boy"s life, an" if bein" suspended means waitin" while the college takes its time to consider whether it wants him back again or not I ain"t goin" to wait. I"m a great believer in a college education, but I don"t know that it cuts much figure whether it"s the same college right through or not. Anyway, you write Mr.

Stebbins."

Arethusa obeyed, and the authorities having seen fit to be uncommonly discreet as to the cause of the young man"s withdrawal, no great difficulty was experienced in finding another campus whereon Aunt Mary"s pride and joy might freely disport himself. Mr. Stebbins threw himself into the affair with all the tact and ardor of an experienced legal mind and soon after Lucinda"s return to her home allowed Arethusa to follow suit, the hopeful younger brother of the latter became a candidate for his second outfit of new sweaters and hat bands that year.

Aunt Mary wrote him a letter upon the occasion of his new start in life, Mr. Stebbins delivered him a lecture, and things went smoothly in consequence for three whole weeks. I say three whole weeks because three whole weeks was a long time for the course of Jack"s life to flow smoothly. At the end of a fortnight affairs were always due to run more rapidly and three weeks produced, as a general thing, some species of climax.

The climax in this case came to time as usual his evil genius inciting the young man to attempt, one very dark night, the shooting of a cat which he thought he saw upon the back fence. Whether he really had seen a cat or not mattered very little in the later development of the matter. He was certainly successful as far as the going off of the gun was concerned, but the damage that resulted, resulted not to any cat, but to the arm of a next-door"s cook, who was peacefully engaged in taking in her week"s wash on the other side of the fence. The cook ceased abruptly to take in the wash, the affair was at once what is technically termed looked into, and three days later Jack became the defendant in a suit for damages.

Naturally Mr. Stebbins was at once notified and he had no choice except to write Aunt Mary.

Aunt Mary was somewhat less patient over the third escapade than she had been with the first two.

The letter found her alone with Lucinda and she read it to herself three times and then read it aloud to her companion. Lucinda, whose thorough knowledge of the imperious will and impervious eardrums of her mistress rendered her, as a rule, extremely monosyllabic, not to say silent, vouchsafed no comment upon the contents of the epistle, and after a few minutes Aunt Mary herself took the field:

"Now, what do you suppose possessed that boy to shoot at a cook?" she asked, regarding the letter with a portentous frown. "Cooks are so awful hard to get nowadays. I don"t see why he didn"t shoot a tramp if he had to shoot somethin"."

"He wa"n"t tryin" to shoot a cook, "pears like," then cried Lucinda-Lucinda"s voice, be it said, _en pa.s.sant_, was of that sibilant and penetrating timbre which is best ill.u.s.trated in the accents of a steamfitter"s file-""pears like he was tryin" for a cat."

"Not a bat," said her mistress correctively; "it was a cat. You look at this letter an" you"ll see. And, anyway, how could a man shootin" at a cat hit a cook?-not "nless she was up a tree birds"-nestin" after owls" eggs.

You don"t seem to pay much attention to what I read to you, Lucinda; only I should think your commonsense would help you out some when it comes to a boy you"ve known from the time he could walk, an" a strange cook. But, anyhow, that"s neither here nor there. The question that bothers me is, what"s to pay with this damage suit? I think myself five hundred dollars is too much for any cook"s arm. A cook ain"t in no such vital need of two arms. If she has to shut the door of the oven while she"s stirrin"

somethin" on the top of the stove, she can easy kick it to with her foot.

It won"t be for long, anyway, and I"m a great believer in making the best of things when you"ve got to."

Lucinda screwed up her face and made no comment. Lucinda"s face in repose was a cross between a monkey"s and a peanut; screwed up, it was particularly awful, and always exasperated her mistress.

"Well, why don"t you say somethin", Lucinda? I ain"t askin" your advice, but, all the same, you can say anything if you"ve got a mind to."

"I ain"t got a mind to say anythin"," the faithful maid rejoined.

"I guess you hit the nail on the head that time," said Aunt Mary, without any unnecessary malevolence concealed behind her sarcasm; then she re-read the note and frowned afresh.

"Five hundred dollars is too much," she said again. "I"m going to write to Mr. Stebbins an" tell him so to-night. He can compromise on two hundred and fifty, just as well as not. Get me some paper and my desk, Lucinda.

Now get a spryness about you."

Lucinda laid aside her work and forthwith got a spryness about her, bringing her mistress" writing-desk with commendable alacrity. Aunt Mary took the writing-desk and wrote fiercely for some time, to the end that she finally wrote most of the fierceness out of herself.

"After all, boys will be boys," she said, as she sealed her letter, "and if this is the end I shan"t feel it"s money wasted. I"m a great believer in bein" patient. Most always, that is. Here, Lucinda you take this to Joshua and tell him to take it right to mail. Be prompt, now. I"m a great believer in doin" things prompt."

Lucinda took the letter and was prompt. "She wants this letter took right to the mail," she said to Joshua, Aunt Mary"s longest-tried servitor.

"Then it"ll be took right to mail," said Joshua.

"She"s pretty mad," said Lucinda.

"Then she"ll soon get over it," replied the other, taking up his hat and preparing to depart for the barn forthwith.

Lucinda returned to Aunt Mary with a species of dried-up sigh. One is not the less a slave because one has been enslaved for twenty years, and Lucinda at moments did sort of peek out through her bars-possibly envying Joshua the daily drives to mail when he had full control of something that was alive.

Lucinda had been, comparatively speaking, young when she had come to wait upon the pleasure of the Watkins millions, and her waiting had been so pertinent and so patient that it had endured over a quarter of a century.

Aunt Mary had been under fifty in the hour of Lucinda"s dawn; she was over seventy now. Jack hadn"t been born then; he was in college now; and Jack"s older brothers and sisters and his dead-and-gone father and mother had been living somewhere out West then, quite hopeful as to their own lives and quite hopeless as to the stern old great-aunt who never had paid any attention to her niece since she had chosen to elope with the doctor"s reprobate son. Now the father and mother were dead and buried, the brothers and sisters reinstated in their rights and had all grown up and become great credits to the old lady, whose heart had suddenly melted at the arrival of five orphans all at once. And there was only Jack to continue to worry about.

Jack was not anything particularly remarkable; he was just one of those lovable good-for-nothings that seem born to get better people into trouble all their lives long. He had been spoiled originally by being ten years younger than the next youngest in the family; and then, when the children had been shipped on to Aunt Mary"s tender mercies, Jack had won her heart immediately because she accidentally discovered that he had never been baptized, and so felt fully justified in re-naming him after her own father and having the name branded into him for keeps by her own religious apparatus. It followed naturally that John Watkins, Jr., Denham, for so her father"s daughter had insisted that her youngest nephew should be called, was the favorite nephew of his aunt.

And it was lucky for him that he was the favorite, for Aunt Mary, who was highly spiced at fifty, became peppery at sixty, and almost biting at seventy. And yet for Jack she would sign checks almost without a murmur.