CHAPTER XVIII THE QUEER BOARDER

Spring marched on apace those days. The garden at Hillcrest began to take form, and the green things sprouted beautifully. Lucas Pritchett was working very hard, for his father did not allow him to neglect any of his regular work to keep the contract the young man had made with Lyddy Bray.

In another line the prospect for a crop was anxiously canvassed, too. The eggs Lyddy had sent for had arrived and, after running the incubator for a couple of days to make sure that they understood it, the girls put the hundred eggs into the trays.

The eggs were guaranteed sixty per cent. fertile and after eight days they tested them as Trent had advised. They left eighty-seven eggs in the incubator after the test.

But the incubator took an enormous amount of attention–at least, the girls thought it did.

This was not so bad by day; but they went to bed tired enough at night, and Lyddy was sure the lamp should be looked to at midnight.

It was three o’clock the first night before ’Phemie awoke with a start, and lay with throbbing pulse and with some sound ringing in her ears which she could not explain immediately. But almost at once she recalled another night–their first one at Hillcrest–when she had gone rambling about the lower floor of the old house.

But she thought of the incubator and leaped out of bed. The lamp might have flared up and cooked all those eggs. Or it might have expired and left them to freeze out there in the washhouse.

She did not arouse Lyddy, but slipped into her wrapper and slippers and crept downstairs with her candle. There had been a sound that aroused her. She heard somebody moving about the kitchen.

“Surely father hasn’t got up–he promised he wouldn’t,” thought ’Phemie.

She was not afraid of outside marauders now. Both Mr. Somers and young Mr. Colesworth were in the house. ’Phemie went boldly into the kitchen from the hall.

The porch door opened and a wavering light appeared–another candle. There was Harris Colesworth, in his robe and slippers, coming from the direction of the washhouse.

’Phemie shrank back and hid by the foot of the stairs. But she was not quick enough in putting her light out–or else he heard her giggle.

“Halt! who goes there?” demanded Colesworth, in a sepulchral voice.

“A–a fr-r-riend,” chattered ’Phemie.

“Advance, friend, and give the countersign,” commanded the young man.

“Chickens!” gasped ’Phemie, convulsed with laughter.

“You’d have had fried eggs, maybe, for all your interest in the incubator,” said Harris, with a chuckle. “So ‘Chickens’ is no longer the password.”

“Oh, they didn’t get too hot?” pleaded the girl, in despair.

“Nope. This is the second time I’ve been out. To tell you the truth,” said Harris, laughing, “I think the incubator is all right and will work like a charm; but I understand they’re a good deal like ships–likely to develop some crotchet at almost any time.”

“But it’s good of you to take the trouble to look at it for us.”

“Sure it is!” he laughed. “But that’s what I’m on earth for–to do good–didn’t you know that, Miss ’Phemie?”

She told her sister about Harris Colesworth’s kindness in the morning. But Lyddy took it the other way about.

“I declare! he can’t keep his fingers out of our pie at any stage of the game; can he?” she snapped.

“Why, Lyd!”

“Oh–don’t talk to me!” returned her older sister, who seemed to be rather snappish this morning. “That young man is getting on my nerves.”

It was Sunday and the Colesworths had engaged a two-seated carriage in town to take Mrs. Castle and Mr. Bray with them to church. There was a seat beside Mr. Somers, behind Old Molly, for one of the girls. The teacher plainly wanted to take Lyddy, but that young lady had not recovered from her ill-temper of the early morning.

“Lyd got out of bed on the wrong side this morning,” said ’Phemie. However, she went with Mr. Somers in her sister’s stead.

And Lyddy Bray was glad to be left alone. No one could honestly call Hillcrest Farm a lonesome place these days!

“I’m not sure that I wouldn’t be glad to be alone here again, with just ’Phemie and father,” the young girl told herself. “There is one drawback to keeping a boarding house–one has no privacy. In trying to make it homelike for the boarders, we lose all our own home life. Ah, dear, well! at least we are earning our support.”

For Lyddy Bray kept her books carefully, and she had been engaged in this new business long enough to enable her to strike a balance. From her present boarders she was receiving thirty-one and a half dollars weekly. At least ten of it represented her profit.

But the two young girls were working very hard. The cooking was becoming a greater burden because of the makeshifts necessary at the open fire. And the washing of bed and table linen was a task that was becoming too heavy for them.

“If we had a couple of other good paying boarders,” mused Lyddy, as she sat resting on the side porch, “we might afford to take somebody into the kitchen to help us. It would have to be somebody who would work cheap, of course; we could pay no fancy wages. But we need help.”

As she thus ruminated she was startled by seeing a figure cross the field from behind the barn. It was not Cyrus Pritchett, although the farmer spent most of his Sabbaths wandering about the fields examining the crops. Corn had not yet been planted, anyway–not here on the Hillcrest Farm.

But this was a man fully as large as Cyrus Pritchett. As he drew nearer, Lyddy thought that he was a man she had never seen before.

He wore a broad-brimmed felt hat–of the kind affected by Western statesmen. His black hair–rather oily-looking it was, like an Indian’s–flowed to the collar of his coat.

That coat was a frock, but it was unbuttoned, displaying a pearl gray vest and trousers of the same shade. He even wore gray spats over his shoes and was altogether more elaborately dressed than any native Lyddy had heretofore seen.

He came across the yard at a swinging stride, and took off his hat with a flourish. She saw then that his countenance was deeply tanned, that he had a large nose, thick, smoothly-shaven lips, and heavy-lidded eyes.

“Miss Bray, I have no doubt?” he began, recovering from his bow.

Lyddy had risen rather quickly, and only nodded. She scarcely knew what to make of this stranger–and she was alone.

“Pray sit down again,” he urged, with a wave of his hand. “And allow me to sit here at your feet. It is a lovely day–but warm.”

“It is, indeed,” admitted Lyddy, faintly.

“You have a beautiful view of the valley here.”

“Yes, sir.”

“I am told below,” said the man, with a free gesture taking in Bridleburg and several square miles of surrounding country, “that you take boarders here at Hillcrest?”

“Yes, sir,” said Lyddy again.

“Good! Your rooms are not yet all engaged, my dear young lady?” said the man, who seemed unable to discuss the simplest subject without using what later she learned to call “his platform manner.”

“Oh, no; we haven’t many guests as yet.”

“Good!” he exclaimed again. Then, after a moment’s pursing of his lips, he added: “This is not strictly speaking a legal day for making bargains. But we may talk of an arrangement; mayn’t we?”

“I do not understand you, sir,” said Lyddy.

“Ah! No! I am referring to the possibility of my taking board with you, Miss Bray.”

“I see,” responded the girl, with sudden interest. “Do you think you would be suited with the accommodations we have to offer?”

“Ah, my dear miss!” he exclaimed, with a broad smile. “I am an old campaigner. I have slept gypsy-fashion under the stars many and many a night. A straw pallet has often been my lot. Indeed, I am naturally simple of taste and habit.”

He said all this with an air as though entirely different demands might reasonably be expected of such as he. He evidently had a very good opinion of himself.

Lyddy did not much care for his appearance; but he was respectably–if strikingly–dressed, and he was perfectly respectful.

“I will show you what we have,” said Lyddy, and rose and accompanied him through the house.

“You do not let any of the rooms in the east wing?” he asked, finally.

“No, sir. Neither upstairs nor down. We probably shall not disturb those rooms at all.”

Finally they talked terms. The stranger seemed to forget all his scruples about doing business on Sunday, for he was a hard bargainer. As a result he obtained from Lyddy quite as good accommodations as Mrs. Castle had–and for two dollars less per week.

Not until they had come downstairs did Lyddy think to ask him his name.

“And one not unknown to fame, my dear young lady,” he said, drawing out his cardcase. “Famous in more than one field of effort, too–as you may see.

“Your terms are quite satisfactory, I will have my trunk brought up in the morning, and I will do myself the honor to sup with you to-morrow evening. Good-day, Miss Bray,” and he lifted his hat and went away whistling, leaving Lyddy staring in surprise at the card in her hand:

Prof. Lemuel Judson Spink, M.D.
Proprietor: Stonehedge Bitters
Likewise of the World Famous
DIAMOND GRITS
“The Breakfast of the Million”

“Why! it’s the Spink man we’ve heard so much about–the boy who was taken out of the poorhouse by grandfather. I–I wonder if I have done right to take him as a boarder?” murmured Lyddy at last.