The Corner House Girls Growing Up

Even as Tess and Dot greeted him, Sammy Pinkney emitted a shriek of dismay. A big auto-van had turned the corner and rolled smoothly along the block. One man on the front seat who was driving the truck said to his mate:

"There's another of 'em, Bill. Net him."

The fellow he spoke to leaped out as the green van came to a halt. He carried a net like a fish seine over his arm. Before the little girls who were fondling Tom Jonah realized that danger threatened – before the frightened Sammy could do more than shout his useless warning – the man threw the net, and old Tom Jonah was entangled in its meshes.

The little girls screamed. Sammy roared a protest. The men paid no attention to the uproar.

"Got a big fish this time, Harry," said Bill, dragging the struggling, growling Tom Jonah to the back of the van. "Give us a hand."

For the big dog, his temper roused, would have done his captor some injury had he been able. The driver of the dog catchers' van drove the other dogs back from the door with a long pole, and then between them he and his mate heaved Tom Jonah into the vehicle.

Sammy Pinkney scurried around for some missile to throw at the dog catchers. The little girls' shrieks brought neighboring children to yards and doors and windows. But there chanced not to be an adult on the block to whom the dog catchers might have listened.

"Oh, Mister! Don't! Don't!" begged Tess, sobbing, and trying to hold by the coat the man who had netted Tom Jonah. "He's a good dog – a real good dog. Don't take him away."

"If you hurt Tom Jonah my sister Ruthie will do something awful to you!" declared Dot, too angry to cry.

"Wish my father was home," said Sammy, threateningly. "He'd fix you dog-catchers!"

"Aw-gowan!" exclaimed the man, pushing Tess so hard that she almost fell, and breaking her hold upon his coat.

But Tess forgot herself in her anxiety for Tom Jonah. She bravely followed him to the very step of the van.

"Give him back! Give him back!" she cried. "You must not hurt Tom Jonah. He never did you any harm. He never did anybody any harm. Give him back to us! Please!"

Her wail made no impression on the man.

"Drive on, Harry," he said. "These kids give me a pain."

The green van moved on. Tom Jonah's gray muzzle appeared at the screened door at the back. He howled mournfully as the van headed toward Main Street.

"Oh, what shall we do? What shall we do?" cried Tess, wringing her hands.

"Let's run tell Ruthie," gasped Dot.

"I wish Neale O'Neil was here," growled Sammy.

But Tess was the bravest of the three. She had no intention of losing sight of poor Tom Jonah, whose mournful cries seemed to show that he knew the fate in store for him.

"Where are you going, Tess?" shouted Sammy, as the Corner House girl kept on past the gate of her own dooryard, after the green van.

"They sha'n't have Tom Jonah!" declared the sobbing Tess. "I – I won't let them."

"And – and Iky Goronofsky says that they make frankfurters out of those poor dogs," moaned Dot, repeating a legend prevalent among the rougher school children at that time.

"Pshaw! he was stringin' you kids," said Sammy, with more wisdom, falling in with Dot behind the determined Tess. "What'll we do? Tess is going right after that old van."

"We mustn't leave her," Dot said. "Oh! I wish Ruthie had seen those horrid men take Tom Jonah."

As it was there seemed nothing to do but to follow the valiant Tess on her quest toward the dog pound. As for Tess herself she had no intention of losing sight of Tom Jonah. She made up her mind that no matter how far the van went the poor old dog who had been their friend for so long should not be deserted.

At the seashore, soon after Tom Jonah had first come to live with the Corner House girls, the dog had been instrumental in saving the lives of both Tess and Dot. He had often guarded them when they played and when they worked. They depended upon him at night to keep away prowlers from the Corner House henroost. No ill-disposed persons ever troubled the premises at the Corner of Willow and Main Streets after one glimpse of Tom Jonah.

"I don't care!" sobbed Tess, her plump cheeks streaked with tears, when her little sister and Sammy caught up with her a block away from home. "I don't care. They sha'n't put poor Tom Jonah in the gas chamber. I know what they do to poor doggies. They sha'n't treat him so!"

"But what'll you do, Tess!" demanded Sammy, amazed by the determination and courage of his little friend.

"I don't know just what I'll do when I get there but I'll do something – you see if I don't, Sammy Pinkney!" threatened this usually mild and retiring Tess Kenway.

CHAPTER XXIV

IT ENGAGES AUNT SARAH'S ATTENTION

Ruth, as has been said, was away from the house when this dreadful thing happened to Tom Jonah. Uncle Rufus was too lame to have followed the dog catchers' van in any case, had he seen the capture of their pet.

But Mrs. MacCall and Aunt Sarah were sitting together sewing in the latter's big front room over the dining-room of the Corner House. Looking out of the window by which she sat, and biting off a thread reflectively, the housekeeper said:

"It's on my mind, Miss Maltby, that our Ruth is not so chirpy as she used to be."

"She's growing up," said Aunt Sarah. "I'll be glad when they're all grown up." And then she added something that would have quite shocked all four of the Corner House girls. "I'll be glad when they are all grown up, and married, and settled down."

"My certie! but you are in haste, woman," gasped the housekeeper. "And it sounds right-down wicked. Wishing the bairns' lives away."

"Do you realize what it's going to mean – these next four or five years?" snapped Aunt Sarah.

"In what way, Miss Maltby?" asked Mrs. MacCall.

"For us," said Aunt Sarah, nodding emphatically. "We're going to have the house cluttered up with boys and young men who will want to marry my nieces."

"Lawk!" gasped the housekeeper. "Will they be standin' in line, think you? Not but the bonny lassies deserve the best there is – "

"Which isn't saying much when it comes to a choice of men," Aunt Sarah sniffed.

"Well," returned Mrs. MacCall, slowly, "of course there'll be none worthy of the lassies. None who deserves our Ruthie. Yet – I'm thinkin' – that that young laddie that was here now – you know, Miss Maltby. Luke Shepard."

"A likeable boy," admitted Aunt Sarah, and that was high praise from the critical spinster.

"Aye," Mrs. MacCall hastened to say, "a very fine young man indeed. And I am moved to say Ruthie liked him."

"Eh!" exclaimed Aunt Sarah.

"You maybe didn't see it. It was plain to me. They two were very fond of each other. Yes, indeed!"

"My niece fond of a boy?" gasped the spinster, bridling.

"Why! were ye not just now speakin' of such a possibeelity?" demanded the housekeeper, and in her surprise, dropping for the moment into broad Scotch. "And they are baith of them old enough tae be thinkin' of matin'. Yes!"

Aunt Sarah still stared in amazement. "Can it be that that seems to have changed Ruth so?" she asked at last.

"You've noticed it?" cried the Scotchwoman.

"Yes. As you have suggested, she seems down-hearted. But why – "

"There's something that went wrong. 'Love's young dream,' as they say, is having a partial eclipse, so it is! I see no letters comin' from that college where the laddie has gone."

"But she hears from Cecile Shepard," said Aunt Sarah. "She reads me extracts from Cecile's letters. A very lively and pleasant girl is Cecile."

"So she is," admitted the housekeeper. "But I'm a sight more interested in the laddie. Why doesn't he write?"

"Why – er – would that be quite the thing, Mrs. MacCall?" asked Aunt Sarah, momentarily losing much of her grimness and seemingly somewhat fluttered by this discussion of Ruth's affair.

"'Twould be almost necessary, Miss Maltby, I can tell you, if he was a laddie of mine," declared the Scotchwoman vigorously. "I'd no have a sweetheart that was either tongue-tied or unable to write."

"Oh, but you take too much for granted," cried Aunt Sarah.

"My observation tells me the two of them are fair lost on each other. I watched 'em while young Shepard was here. It's true they are young; but they'll never be younger, and it's the young lovin' and matin' was made for – not for old bodies."

"You – you quite surprise me," said Aunt Sarah.

"You'd best get over your surprise, Miss Maltby," said the very practical housekeeper. "You should have your eyes opened. You should see them together again."

"Why not?" demanded Aunt Sarah, suddenly.

"Why not what?"

"Let the children have Cecile and her brother here for over Sunday – for a week end. Let them give a little party. I am sure I loved parties when I was a young girl and lived at this Corner House, when mother was alive."

"It's a good idea," said the housekeeper. "I'll make some layer cakes for the party. We'll not need to go to the expense of a caterer – "

She would have gone on immediately planning for the affair had she not, on glancing through the window, seen the dog catchers' green van rattling over the crossing of Main Street.

"There's those dog catchers!" she exclaimed. "I wonder if Tom Jonah's safe. There are some children running and crying after it – they've lost a pet I've no doubt."

Then suddenly she sprang to her feet.

"Miss Maltby!" she cried. "'Tis our Tess and Dot – and Sammy Pinkney, the little scamp! It must be either his bulldog or old Tom Jonah those pestilent men have caught."

Aunt Sarah had very good eyes indeed. She had already spied the party and she could see in the back of the van.

"It is Tom Jonah!" she exclaimed. "They must be stopped. How dared those men take our dog?"

Mrs. MacCall, who had no shoes on, could not hurry out. But Aunt Sarah was dressed for company as she always was in the afternoon. She amazed the sputtering housekeeper by stopping only to throw a fleecy hood over her hair before hurrying out of the front door of the Corner House.

Aunt Sarah Maltby seldom left the premises save for church on Sunday. She did not even ride much in the girls' motor-car. She had made up her mind that an automobile was an unnecessary luxury and a "new-fangled notion" anyway; therefore she seldom allowed herself to be coaxed into the car.

She never went calling, claiming vigorously that she was "no gadabout, she hoped." It was an astonishing sight, therefore, to see her marching along Willow Street in the wake of the crying, excited children, who themselves followed in the wake of the dog catchers' van.

The van traveled so fast that Tess and Dot and Sammy could scarcely keep it in sight; while the children were so far ahead of Aunt Sarah that the old woman could not attract their attention when she called.

It was a most embarrassing situation, to say the least. To add to its ridiculousness, Mrs. MacCall met Agnes as she came in swinging her books, and told her at the side door what had happened.

Agnes flung down her books and "hoo-hooed" with all her might for Neale O'Neil. As soon as he answered, sticking his head out of his little bedroom window under the eaves of Con Murphy's cottage, Agnes left the housekeeper and the excited Finnish girl to explain the difficulty to Neale, while she ran after Aunt Sarah.

Soon, therefore, there was a procession of excited Corner House folk trailing through the Milton Streets to the pound. Sammy and the two little girls trotting on behind the dog catchers' van; then Aunt Sarah Maltby, looking neither to right nor left but appearing very stern indeed; then Agnes running as hard as she could run; followed by Neale at a steady lope.

The boy soon overtook his girl chum.

"What under the canopy are we going to do?" he demanded.

"Save Tom Jonah!" declared Agnes, her cheeks blazing.

"The kids are going to do that," chuckled Neale in spite of his shortness of breath. "Guess we'd better save Aunt Sarah, hadn't we?"

"Goodness, Neale!" giggled Agnes, "they won't try to shut her up in the pound I should hope."

They did not overtake the determined woman before she was in sight of the dog refuge. The van had driven into the yard. Before the gate could be shut Tess, followed closely by the trembling Dot and by the more or less valiant Sammy, pushed through likewise and faced the superintendent of the lost dog department.

"What do you little folks want?" asked this kindly man, smiling down upon the trio.

"We want Tom Jonah," said Tess, her voice quivering but her manner still brave.

"You've just got to give us Tom Jonah," Dot added, gulping down a sob.

"You bet you have!" said Sammy, clenching his fists.

"'Tom Jonah'?" repeated the man. "Is that a dog?"

Tess pointed. There was Tom Jonah at the screened door of the van.

"That's him," she said. "He never did anybody any harm. These men just stole him."

That was pretty strong language for Tess Kenway to use; but she was greatly overwrought.

"You mean they took him out of your yard?"

"They took him off'n the street," said Sammy. "But he'd only jumped the fence because he saw us comin' home from school."

"He isn't muzzled," said the man.

"He – he don't bite," wailed Dot. "He – he ain't got any teeth to bite!"

He was an old dog as the superintendent could see. Besides, he knew that his men were more eager to secure the fines than they were to be kind or fair to the owners of dogs.

"How about this, Harry?" he asked the driver of the van.

"The dog's ugly as sin," growled the man. "Ain't he, Bill?"

"Tried to chew me up," declared the man with the net.

"Say!" blurted out Sammy, "wouldn't you try to chew a feller up if he caught you in a fish-net and dragged you to a wagon like that? Huh!"

Harry burst out laughing. The superintendent said, quietly:

"Let the big dog out."

"Not me, Boss," said Bill, backing away. "That dog's got it in for me."

"Let me!" exclaimed Tess. "Tom Jonah would not bite any of us – not even if he had hydrophobia. No, sir!"

"Of course he wouldn't!" acclaimed Dot. "But he couldn't have hydro – hydro – Well, whatever that is."

"Keep those other dogs back, Bill, and let the little girl have her Tom Jonah," said the superintendent. "I guess there's been a mistake. These are the Corner House girls, and that is their old dog. I remember him. He wouldn't harm a fly."

"No. But he'd chaw the leg off'n me, Boss," said Bill, who did not like dogs and therefore was afraid of them. "Besides, all's fish that comes into my net, you know."

"Go away," commanded the other man, taking the long pole himself. "I will let him out."

"Oh, Tom Jonah!" cried Tess, running to the door of the van. "Be good now. The man is going to let you out and we will take you home."

The old dog stopped whining but he did not, as Sammy whispered to Dot, look any too pleasant. When the superintendent opened the door, after crowding back the smaller dogs that filled the van, Tess called to Tom Jonah to come out. He leaped down. The next instant he whirled and would have charged the two men who had caused him such discomfort and disgrace, his jaws emitting terrific growls.

"Stop, Tom Jonah!" from Tess and Dot, and "Cut it out, Tom Jonah!" from Sammy, were all that saved the day. The dog had never yet been cowed of spirit and, old as he was, he would have attacked a lion, let alone a pair of faint-hearted rowdies.

"Take my advice, boys," said the superintendent of the pound. "Don't go around that block by the old Corner House again. This old fellow will not forget either of you."

"He ought to be shot," growled Bill.

"You do such a thing – such a desperately wicked thing!" exclaimed a sharp voice, "and I will see that you are prosecuted to the full extent of the law."

It was Aunt Sarah who appeared like an angel of wrath at the gateway.

"Mr. Howbridge shall know about your actions – you two men there! And as for you," the indignant old woman added, fixing her gaze upon the superintendent of the pound, "let me tell you that the Stower estate makes a contribution yearly to your Society, which contribution partly pays your salary. I hold you responsible for the character of the men you engage to collect the poor dogs who are neglected and who have no homes. They are not supposed to take the pets of people who amply care for dumb animals. Another occasion like this and you will hear from it – mark my word, sir!"

"Oh, my!" sighed Dot, afterward, her eyes still round with wonder, "I never did suppose Aunt Sarah could speak so big. Isn't she just wonnerful?"

While the children were caressing Tom Jonah and the superintendent was striving to pacify the indignant Aunt Sarah, Agnes and Neale came panting to the pound.

"Guess it's all over but the shouting," said Neale, with satisfaction. "Down, Tom Jonah! Down, with you! Don't jump all over my best suit of clothes."

"And spare me your kisses, good old fellow!" begged Agnes. "We know just how glad you are to get out of jail. Who wouldn't be?"

"Je-ru-sa-lem!" ejaculated Sammy Pinkney; "who'd ha' thought of Tom Jonah getting pinched?"

Before the party got away from the pound, Ruth came racing down in the automobile. Returning from her first drive alone as a licensed chauffeur, she had heard of the family's migration to the pound and had come in haste to the rescue of Tom Jonah – and the remainder of the Corner House party.

"For goodness' sake! do get into the automobile and act as though we'd just come for a ride," exclaimed the oldest Corner House girl. "Did ever any one hear of such ridiculous things as happen to us?"

"You need not be so snippy," said Agnes, in some heat. "If Tom Jonah had actually been put into that awful gas chamber they tell about – "

"They don't do such things until it is positive that nobody will claim the dog – unless he really is afflicted with rabies," Ruth said. "I'm surprised at Aunt Sarah."

"You needn't be, young lady," said Miss Maltby. "You needn't be surprised at anything I may do. I have long known that I belonged to a family of crazy people, and now I guess I've proved myself as crazy as any of you."

However, they could laugh at it after a while. And they did not begrudge any trouble to save poor old Tom Jonah from inconvenience. While the children were away at school thereafter they were careful to put the old dog on a long leash in a shady corner of the yard.

After all, Tom Jonah had been a vagabond for a good part of his life, and old as he was sometimes the spirit of what Agnes called "the wanderlust" (she was just beginning German) came over him and he would go away to visit friends for two or three days at a time.

"He'll go visiting no more at present," Ruth said with decision.

However, other plans for visiting progressed. Aunt Sarah and Mrs. MacCall proceeded to carry out their conspiracy. The suggestion was made at just the right time, and in the right way, for Cecile and Luke to be invited to the old Corner House for a week-end party, and the party itself was planned.

So it came to pass that Cecile Shepard wrote her brother Luke that very next week:

"I suppose, Luke dear, you have received your invitation to Ruth's party. Of course, dear boy, we must both go. I would not disappoint or offend her for the world – nor must you. Buck up, old pal! This is a hard row to hoe, but I guess you'll have to hoe it alone. I can only sit on the fence and root for you.

"Aunt Lorena declares the world is coming to an end. Neighbor sent Samri over to the house to ask Auntie what Ruth's last name was and how to find her. He was so mad with you that night you told him, he evidently did not catch her name. And then, Aunt Lorena says, the very next morning Neighbor started out and was gone all day.

"He could not have gone to see Ruth. Of course not! Certain sure if he had, I should have heard of it from either Ruth herself or from Agnes. But he might have gone to Milton to make inquiries about her.

"However, I am afraid whatever he did that day he was away, it did not please him. He returned about dark, blew up Samri in the yard for some little thing, rampaged around in his most awful way, and finally, Aunt Lorena says, she could hear him scolding the butler all through dinner and half the evening. Then, she believes, the poor old Jap crept into the toolshed to spend the rest of the night out of sound of his master's voice."

Luke would certainly not have gone to Milton and to the Corner House at this time save that he, like his sister, could not offend those who had been so kind to him there. And he was hungry for a sight of Ruth!

Seeing her, he feared, would not aid him to be manly and put his desires aside while he fought his way through college. He knew that Neighbor would do exactly what he had said. Never could he look to the old gentleman for a friendly word, or a bit of help over a hard financial place again. As Mr. Henry Northrup was so fond of saying, he always said what he meant and meant what he said!

The party was to be on Saturday evening, and the Friday when the Shepards had promised to arrive at the Corner House came, and Luke and Cecile went their separate ways to Milton by train. As he had not sent word by just what train he would arrive the young man did not expect anybody to meet him. He walked up from the station with his suitcase and came in sight of the old Corner House without being spied by anybody on the premises.

A wintry wind was blowing, and the great shade trees about the house were almost bare of leaves. Yet the Stower homestead could never look anything but cheerful and homelike. Luke quickened his pace as he approached the gate. There was somebody inside that old house, he was quite sure, whom he longed desperately to see.

He opened the gate and swung up the walk to the door. Bounding up the steps he reached forth his hand to touch the annunciator button when he caught sight of something standing on the porch beside the door – something that brought a gasp of amazement from his lips and actually caused him to turn pale.

CHAPTER XXV

LOOKING AHEAD

Ruth had become quite excited over the prospect of the coming party. Of course, not as excited as Agnes, but sufficiently so to become more like her oldtime self.

She went about with a smile on her lips and a gleam in her eyes that had been missing of late. Agnes hinted that she must have some particular reason for being so "chipper."

"Somebody's coming you like, Ruthie Kenway!" the next oldest sister declared.

For once Ruth did not deny the accusation. She merely blushed faintly and said nothing.

Friday afternoon was a particularly busy time for Ruth. She found some things had been forgotten and she went down town to attend to them. She walked, and in coming back, hastening up Main Street, at the corner of the avenue that gave a glimpse of the railroad station, she came face to face with the queer old gentleman of the green umbrella!

"Ha!" ejaculated the old man, stopping abruptly. "So! I find you at last, do I?"

"Ye-yes, sir," stammered Ruth.

To tell the truth, he looked so fierce, he had such a hawklike eye, and he spoke so harshly that he fairly frightened the oldest Corner House girl. She felt as though he must think she had been hiding from him purposely.

"I was in your town here once before looking for you. You were not to be found," he said.

"Ye-yes, sir," admitted Ruth. "I guess I was out that day."

"Out? I didn't know where to hunt for you," growled the old man, shaking the green umbrella and looking as fierce, Ruth thought, as though he might like to shake her in the same way.

"Ye-yes, sir," she stammered.

"Don't say that again!" roared the stranger. "Speak sensibly. Or are you as big a fool as most other females!"

At that Ruth grew rather piqued. She regained her self-possession and began to study the old man.

"I'm not sure how foolish you consider all women to be, sir," she said. "Perhaps I am merely an average girl."

"No. I'll be bound you've more sense than some," he grumbled. "Otherwise you wouldn't have pulled me back from that train. I'd have been run over like enough."