The Girls of Hillcrest Farm: or, The Secret of the Rocks

Mr. Bray knew all about the boarding house project and approved of it. “Why, I can soon help around myself. And I must do something,” he told them, that evening, “or I shall go crazy. I couldn’t endure the rest cure.” But it was complete rest that he had to endure for several days after his unexpected arrival.

The girls gave up their room to their father, and went upstairs to sleep. ’Phemie had to admit that even she was glad there was at last somebody else in the house. Especially a man!

“But I never have thought to ask Mr. Pritchett about his being up here with that Spink man last Saturday night,” Lyddy said, sleepily.

“You’d better let it drop,” advised ’Phemie. “We don’t want to get the whole Pritchett family down on us.”

“What nonsense! Of course I shall ask him,” declared her sister.

But as it happened something occurred the following day to quite put this small matter out of Lyddy’s mind. The postman brought the first letter in answer to their advertisement. Lyddy was about to tear open the envelope when she halted in amazement. The card printed in the corner included the number of Trimble Avenue right next to the big tenement house in which the Brays had lived before coming here to Hillcrest.

“Isn’t that strange?” she murmured, and read the card again:

Commonwealth Chemical Company407 Trimble AvenueEasthampton

“Right from the very next door!” sparkled ’Phemie. “Don’t that beat all!–as Lucas says.”

But Lyddy had now opened the letter and read as follows:

“L. Bray, Hillcrest Farm, Bridleburg P. O.

“Dear Madam:

“I have read your advertisement and believe that you offer exactly what my father and I have been looking for–a quiet, home-like boarding house in the hills, and not too far away for me to get easily back and forth. If agreeable, we shall come to Bridleburg Saturday and would be glad to have you meet the 10:14 train on its arrival. If both parties are suited we can then discuss terms.

“Respectfully,“Harris Colesworth.”

“Why, what’s the matter, Lyd?” demanded her sister, in amazement.

But Lyddy Bray did not explain. In her own mind she was much disturbed. She was confident that the writer of this note was the “fresh” young fellow who had always been at work in the chemical laboratory right across the air-shaft from her kitchen window!

Of course, it was quite by chance–in all probability–that he had answered her advertisement. Yet Lyddy Bray had an intuition that if she answered the letter, and the Colesworths came here to Hillcrest, trouble would ensue.

She had hoped very much to obtain boarders, and to get even one thus early in the season seemed too good to be true. Yet, now that she had got what she wanted, Lyddy was doubtful if she wanted it after all.

CHAPTER XIV

THE COLESWORTHS

Mr. Bray fell in with the boarder project, as we have seen, with enthusiasm. Although he could do nothing as yet, his mind was active enough and he gaily planned with ’Phemie what they should do and how they should arrange the rooms for the horde of visitors who were, they were sure, already on their way to Hillcrest.

“Though Lyd won’t show the very first letter she’s received in answer to our ad.,” complained the younger sister. “What’s the matter with those folks, Lyddy? Do they actually live right there near where we did on Trimble Avenue?”

“That was a loft building next to us,” said their father, curiously. “Who are the people, daughter?”

“Somebody by the name of Colesworth. The Commonwealth Chemical Company office. It’s about an old man to stay here.”

“One man only!” exclaimed ’Phemie.

“With a young man–the one who writes–to come up over Sundays, I suppose,” acknowledged Lyddy, doubtfully.

“Goody!” cried her sister. “That sounds better.”

“Aren’t you ashamed of yourself, ’Phemie!” chided Lyddy, with some asperity.

But Mr. Bray only laughed. “I guess I can play ‘he-chaperon’ for all the young men who come here,” he said. “Your sister is only making fun, Lydia.”

But Lyddy was more worried in secret about the Colesworth proposition than she was ready to acknowledge. She “just felt” that Harris Colesworth was the young man who had helped them the evening of the fire in the Trimble Avenue tenement.

“He found out our name, of course, and when he saw my advertisement he knew who it was. He may even have found out where we were going when we left for the country. In some way he could have done so,” thought Lyddy, putting the young man’s character before her mind in the very worst possible light.

“He is altogether too persistent. I hope he is as energetic in a better way–I hope he attends to his business as faithfully as he seems to attend to our affairs,” continued Lyddy, bitterly.

“I don’t suppose this idea of his father coming up here into the hills is entirely an excuse for him to become familiar with–with us. But it looks very much like it. I–I wonder what kind of a man old Mr. Colesworth can be?”

Lyddy ruminated upon the letter she had received all that day and refused to answer it right away. Indeed, as far as she could see, the letter did not really need an answer. This Harris Colesworth spoke just as though he expected they would be only too glad to meet him on Saturday with a rig.

“And, if it were anybody else, I suppose I would be glad to do so,” Lyddy finally had to admit. “I suppose that ‘beggars mustn’t be choosers’; and if this Harris Colesworth isn’t a perfectly proper young man to have about, father will very quickly attend to his case.”

Really, Lyddy Bray thought much more about the Colesworths than her sister and father thought she did. After being urged by ’Phemie several times she finally allowed her sister to reply to the letter, promising to have a carriage at the station for the train mentioned in Harris Colesworth’s letter.

Of course, this meant hiring Lucas Pritchett and the buckboard. Lucas was at Hillcrest a good deal of the time that week. He got the garden plowed and the early potatoes planted, as well as some few other seeds which would not be hurt by the late frosts.

Mr. Bray got around very slowly; at first he could only walk up and down in the sun, or sit on the porch, well wrapped up.

Like most men born in the country and forced to be city dwellers for many years, John Bray had longed more deeply than he could easily express for country living. He appreciated the sights and sounds about him–the mellow, refreshing air that blew over the hills–the sunshine and the pattering rain which, on these early spring days, drifted alternately across the fields and woods.

With the girls he planned for the future. Some day they would have a cow. There was pasture on the farm for a dozen. And already Lyddy was studying poultry catalogs and trying to figure out a little spare money to purchase some eggs for hatching.

Of course they had no hens and at this time of the year the neighbors were likely to want their own setting hens for incubating purposes. Lyddy sounded Silas Trent, the mail-carrier, about this and Mr. Trent had an offer to make.

“I tell ye what it is,” said the garrulous Silas, “the chicken business is a good business–if ye kin ’tend to it right. I tried it–went in deep for incubator, brooders, and the like; and it would have been all right if I didn’t hafter be away from home so much durin’ the day.

“My wife’s got rheumatiz, and she can’t git out to ’tend to little chicks, and for a few weeks they need a sight of attention–that’s right. They’d oughter be fed every two hours, or so, and watched pretty close.

“So I had ter give it up last year, an’ this year I ain’t put an egg in my incubator.

“But if I could git ’em growed to scratchin’ state–say, when they’re broiler-size–I sartainly would like it. Tell ye what I’ll do, Miss. I’ll let ye have my incubator. It’s 200-egg size. In course, ye don’t hafter fill it first time if ye don’t wanter. Put in a hundred eggs and see how ye come out.”

“But how could I pay you?” asked Lyddy.

“I’ll sell ye the incubator outright, if ye want to buy. And I’ll take my pay in chickens when they’re broiler-size–say three months old.”

“What do you want for your incubator?” queried Lyddy, thoughtfully.

“Ten dollars. It’s a good one. And I’ll take a flock of twenty three-months-old chicks in pay for it–fifteen pullets and five cockerels. What kind of hens do you favor, Miss Bray?”

Lyddy told him the breed she had thought of purchasing–and the strain.

“Them’s fine birds,” declared Mr. Trent. “For heavy fowl they are good layers–and when ye butcher one of ’em for the table, ye got suthin’ to eat. Now, you think my offer over. I’ll stick to it. And I’ll set the incubator up and show ye how to run it.”

Lyddy was very anxious to venture into the chicken business–and here was a chance to do it cheaply. It was the five dollars for a hundred hatching eggs that made her hesitate.

But Aunt Jane had shown herself to be more than a little interested in the girls’ venture at Hillcrest Farm, and when she expressed the keys of the garret chests and bureaus to Lyddy–so that the girl could get at the stores of linen left from the old doctor’s day–she sent, too, twenty-five dollars.

“Keep it against emergencies. Pay it back when you can. And don’t let’s have no talk about it,” was the old lady’s characteristic note.

Lyddy was only doubtful as to whether this desire of hers to raise chickens was really “an emergency.” But finally she decided to venture, and she wrote off for the eggs, sending the money by a post-office order, and Lucas brought up Silas Trent’s incubator.

Friday night Trent drove up to Hillcrest and spent the evening with the Brays. He set the incubator up in the little washhouse, which opened directly off the back porch. It was a small, tight room, with only one window, and was easily heated by an oil-lamp. The lamp of the incubator itself would do the trick, Trent said.

He leveled the machine with great care, showed Lyddy all about the trays, the water, the regulation of heat, and gave her a lot of advice on various matters connected with the raising of chicks with the “wooden hen.”

They were all vastly interested in the new vocation and the evening passed pleasantly enough. Just before Trent went, he asked:

“By the way, what’s Jud Spink doing up this way so much? I seen him again to-day when I came over the ridge. He was crossin’ the back of your farm. He didn’t have no gun; and, at any rate, there ain’t nothin’ in season jest now–’nless it’s crows,” and the mail-carrier laughed.

“Spink?” asked Mr. Bray, who had not yet gone to bed. “Who is he?”

“Lemuel Judson Spink,” explained ’Phemie. “He’s a man who used to live here with grandfather when he was a boy–when Spink was a boy; not grandfather.”

“He’s a rich man now,” said Lyddy. “He owns a breakfast food.”

“Diamond Grits,” added ’Phemie.

“He’s rich enough,” grunted Trent. “Rich enough so’t he can loaf around Bridleburg for months at a time. Been here now for some time.”

“Why, could that be the Spink your Aunt Jane told me once made her an offer for the farm?” asked Mr. Bray, thoughtfully.

“For Hillcrest?” cried ’Phemie. “Oh, I hope not.”

“Well, child, if she could sell the place it would be a good thing for Jane. She has none too much money.”

“But why didn’t she sell to him?” asked Lyddy, quite as anxious as her sister.

“He didn’t offer her much, if anything, for it.”

“Ain’t that like Jud?” cackled Trent. “He is allus grouching about the old doctor for being as tight as the bark to a tree; but when it comes to a bargain, Jud Spink will wring yer nose ev’ry time–if he can. Glad Mis’ Hammon’ didn’t sell to him.”

“Perhaps he didn’t want Hillcrest very much,” said Mr. Bray, quietly.

“He don’t want nothin’ ’nless it’s cheap,” declared Trent. “He’s picked up some mortgage notes, and the like, on property he thinks he can foreclose on. Got a jedgment against the Widder Harrison’s little place over the ridge, I understand. But Jud Spink wouldn’t pay more’n ha’f price for a gold eagle. He’d claim ’twas second-hand, if it warn’t fresh from the mint,” and the mail-carrier went off, chuckling over his own joke.

Both Lyddy and ’Phemie forgot, however, about the curious actions of Mr. Spink, or his desire to buy Hillcrest, in their interest in the coming of the only people who had, thus far, answered their advertisement for boarders.

Lucas met the 10:14 train on Saturday morning, and before noon he drove into the side yard with an old gentleman and a young man on the rear seat of the buckboard.

Before this the two girls, working hard, had swept and garnished the whole lower floor of the big farmhouse, save the east wing, which was locked. Indeed, Lyddy had never ventured into the old doctor’s suite of offices, for she couldn’t find the key.

A fire had been laid and was burning cheerfully in the dining-room–that apartment being just across the square side entrance hall from the kitchen. Lyddy was busy over the cooking arrangements when the visitors arrived, and ’Phemie was giving the finishing touches to the table in the dining-room.

But Mr. Bray, leaning on his cane, met the Colesworths as they alighted from the buckboard. Lucas drove away at once, promising to return again with the team in time to catch the four-fifty train back to town.

Lyddy found time to peep out of the kitchen window. Yes! there was that very bold young man who had troubled her so much–at times–while they lived in Trimble Avenue.

He met Mr. Bray with a warm handshake, and he helped his father up the wide stone steps with a delicacy that would have pleased Lyddy in anybody else.

But she had made up her mind that Harris Colesworth was going to be a very objectionable person to have about, and so she would not accept his friendly attitude or thoughtfulness as real virtues. He might attract the rest of the family–already ’Phemie was standing in the door, smiling and with her hand held out; but Lyddy Bray proposed to watch this young man very closely!

CHAPTER XV

ANOTHER BOARDER

Lyddy heard her sister and Harris Colesworth in the hall, and then in the dining-room. The girls had not made a fire in any other room in the house. It took too much wood, and the dining-room was large enough to be used as a sitting-room “for company,” too.

And with the fresh maple branches and arbutus decorating the space over the mantel, and the great dish of violets on the table, and the odorous plum branches everywhere, that dining-room was certainly an attractive apartment.

The old-fashioned blue-and-white china and the few pieces of heavy silverware “dressed” the table very nicely. The linen was yellow with age, but every glass and spoon shone.

The sun streamed warmly in at the windows, the view from which was lovely. Lyddy heard the appreciative remarks of the young man as ’Phemie ushered him in.

But she ran out to greet the old gentleman. The elder Colesworth was sixty or more–a frail, scholarly-looking man, with a winning smile. He, like Mr. Bray, leaned on a cane; but Mr. Bray was at least fifteen years Mr. Colesworth’s junior.

“So you are ‘L. Bray’; are you?” asked the old gentleman, shaking hands with her. “You are the elder daughter and head of the household, your father tells me.”

“I am older than ’Phemie–yes,” admitted Lyddy, blushing. “But we have no ‘head’ here. I do my part of the work, and she does hers.”

“And, please God,” said Mr. Bray, earnestly, “I shall soon be able to do mine.”

“Work is the word, then!” cried the old gentleman. “I tell Harris that’s all that is the matter with me. I knocked off work too early. ‘Retired,’ they call it. But it doesn’t pay–it doesn’t pay.”

“There will be plenty for you to do up here, Mr. Colesworth,” suggested Lyddy, laughing. “We’ll let you chop your own wood, if you like. But perhaps picking flowers for the table will be more to your taste–at first.”

“I don’t know–I don’t know,” returned the old gentleman. “I was brought up on a farm. I used to know how to swing an axe. And I can remember yet how I hated a buck-saw.”

They went into the house; but Lyddy slipped back to the kitchen and allowed her father to follow Harris Colesworth and ’Phemie, with the old gentleman, into the dining-room.

’Phemie soon came out to help, leaving their father to entertain the visitors while dinner was being served. Lyddy had prepared a simple meal, of which the staple was the New England standby–baked beans.

She had been up before light, had built a huge fire in the brick oven, had heated it to a high temperature, and had then baked her pies, a huge pan of gingerbread, her white bread, and potatoes for dinner. She had steamed her “brown loaf” in a kettle hanging from the crane, and the sealed beanpot had been all night in the ashes on the hearth, the right “finish” being given in the brick oven as it gradually cooled off.

The girl had had wonderfully good luck with her baking. The bread was neither “all crust” nor was it dough in the middle. The pies were flaky as to crust and the apples which filled them were tender.

When Lyddy brought in the beanpot, wrapped in a blue and white towel to retain the heat, she met Harris Colesworth for the first time. To her surprise he did not attempt to appear amazed to see her.

“Miss Bray!” he cried, coming forward to shake hands with her. “I have been telling your father that we are already acquainted. But I never did expect to see you again when you sold out and went away from Trimble Avenue that morning.”

“Shows how small the world is,” said Mr. Bray, smiling. “We lived right beside the building in which Mr. Colesworth works, and he saw our advertisement in the paper – ”

“Oh, I was sure it was Miss Bray,” interrupted young Colesworth, openly acknowledging his uncalled-for interest (so Lyddy expressed it to herself) in their affairs.

“You see,” said this very frank young man, “I knew your name was Bray. And I knew you were going into the country for Mr. Bray’s health. I–I even asked at the hospital about you several times,” he added, flushing a little.

“How very kind!” murmured Lyddy, but without looking at him, as ’Phemie brought in some of the other dishes.

“Not at all; I was interested,” said the young man, laughing. “You always were afraid of getting acquainted with me when I used to watch you working about your kitchen. But now, Miss Bray, if father decides to come out here to board with you, you’ll just have to be acquainted with me.”

Mr. Bray laughed at this, and ’Phemie giggled. Lyddy’s face was a study. It did seem impossible to keep this very presuming young man at a proper distance.

But they gathered around the table then, and Lyddy had another reason for blushing. The visitors praised her cooking highly, and when they learned of the old-fashioned means by which the cooking was done, their wonder grew.

And Lyddy deserved some praise, that was sure. The potatoes came out of their crisp skins as light as feathers. The thickened pork gravy that went with them was something Mr. Colesworth the elder declared he had not tasted since he was a boy.

And when the beans were ladled from the pot–brown, moist, every bean firm in its individual jacket, but seasoned through and through–the Colesworths fairly reveled in them. The fresh bread and good butter, and the flaky wedges of apple pie, each flanked by its pilot of cheese, were likewise enjoyed.

“If you can put us up only half comfortably,” declared the elder Colesworth, bowing to Lyddy, “I can tell you right now, young lady, that we will stay. Let us see your rooms, we will come to terms, and then I’ll take a nap, if you will allow me. I need it after this heavy dinner. Why, Harris! I haven’t eaten so heartily for months.”

“Never saw you sail into the menu with any more enjoyment, Dad,” declared his son, in delight.

But Lyddy made her sister show them over the house. They were some time in making up their minds regarding the choice of apartments; but finally they decided upon one of the large rooms the girls proposed making over into bed-chambers on the ground floor. This room was nearest the east wing, had long windows opening upon the side porch, and with the two small beds removed from the half-furnished rooms on the second floor of the east wing, and brought downstairs, together with one or two other pieces of furniture, the Colesworths declared themselves satisfied with the accommodations.

Young Colesworth would come out on Saturdays and return Monday mornings. He would arrange with Lucas to drive him back and forth. And the old gentleman would come out, bag and baggage, on the coming Monday to take possession of the room.

To bind the bargain Harris handed Lyddy fifteen dollars, and asked for a receipt. Fifteen dollars a week! Lyddy had scarcely dared ask for it–had done so with fear and trembling, in fact. But the Colesworths seemed to consider it quite within reason.

“Oh, ’Phemie!” gasped Lyddy, hugging her sister tight out in the kitchen. “Just think of fifteen dollars coming in every week. Why! we can all live on that!”

“M–m; yes,” said ’Phemie, ruminatively. “But hasn’t he a handsome nose?”

“Who–what – ’Phemie Bray! haven’t you anything else in your head but young men’s noses?” cried her sister, in sudden wrath.

But it was a beginning. They had really “got into business,” as their father said that night at the supper table.

“I only fear that the work will be too much for us,” he observed.

“For ’Phemie and me, you mean, Father,” said Lyddy, firmly. “You are not to work. You’re to get well. That is your business–and your only business.”

“You girls will baby me to death!” cried Mr. Bray, wiping his eyes. “I refuse to be laid on the shelf. I hope I am not useless – ”

“My goodness me! Far from it,” cried ’Phemie. “But you’ll be lots more help to us when you are perfectly well and strong again.”

“There’ll be plenty you can do without taxing your strength–and without keeping you indoors,” Lyddy added. “Just think if we get the chicken business started. You can do all of that–after the biddies are hatched.”

“I feel so much better already, girls,” declared their father, gravely, “that I am sure I shall have a giant’s strength before fall.”

Aunt Jane had written them, however, certain advice which the doctor at the hospital had given to her regarding Mr. Bray. He was to be discouraged from performing any heavy tasks of whatsoever nature, and his diet was to consist mainly of milk and eggs–tissue-building fuel for the system.

He had worked so long in the hat shop that his lungs were in a weakened state, if not actually affected. For months they would have to watch him carefully. And to return to his work in the city would be suicidal.

Therefore were Lyddy and ’Phemie more than ever anxious to make the boarders’ project pay. And with the Colesworths’ fifteen dollars a week it seemed as though a famous start had been made in that direction.

By serving simple food, plainly cooked, Lyddy was confident that she could keep the table for all five from the board paid by Mr. Colesworth and his son. If they got other boarders, a goodly share of their weekly stipends could be added on the profit side of the ledger.

Lucas helped them for a couple of hours Monday morning, and the girls managed to put the room the newcomers had chosen into readiness for the old gentleman. Lucas drove to town to meet Mr. Colesworth. Lucas was beginning to make something out of the Bray girls’ project, too, and he grinned broadly as he said to ’Phemie:

“I’m goin’ to be able to put up for a brand new buggy nex’ fall, Miss ’Phemie–a better one than Joe Badger’s got. What ’twixt this cartin’ boarders over the roads, and makin’ Miss Lyddy’s garden, I’m going to be well fixed.”

“On the road to be a millionaire; are you, Lucas?” suggested ’Phemie, laughing.

“Nope. Jest got one object in view,” grinned Lucas.

“What’s that?”

“I wanter drive you to church in my new buggy, and make Joe Badger an’ that Nettie Meyers look like thirty cents. That’s what I want.”

“Oh, Lucas! That isn’t a very high ambition,” she cried.

“But it’s goin’ to give me an almighty lot of satisfaction,” declared the young farmer. “You won’t go back on me; will yer, Miss ’Phemie?”