The Corner House Girls Among the Gypsies

“All right, then. It’s only polite to offer it back to them. Then if they don’t want it we’ll know that it is ours and even Ruth won’t say anything.”

“But – but when my Alice-doll grows up – ”

“Now, don’t be a little piggie, Dot Kenway!” exclaimed Tess, rather crossly. “When your wrist gets big enough so the bracelet won’t slip over your hand so easy, you will want to wear it yourself – just as I do. And Agnes wants it, too.”

“Oh! But it’s ours – if it isn’t the Gypsy ladies’,” Dot hastened to say.

Two claimants for the ornament were quite enough. She did not wish to hear of any other people desiring to wear it.

As it chanced, Tess and Dot heard about the Gypsy encampment on the Buckshot Road through the tongue of neighborhood gossip, quite as had Sammy’s mother. Margaret and Holly Pease heard the store man tell their mother; and having enviously eyed the silver bracelet in the possession of the Kenway girls, they ran to tell the latter about the Gypsies.

“They’ve come back,” declared Margaret decidedly, “to look for that bracelet you’ve got. You’ll see them soon enough.”

“Oh, Margie! do you think so?” murmured Tess, while Dot was immediately so horror-stricken that tears came to her eyes.

“Maybe they will bring the police and have you locked up,” continued the cheerful Pease child. “You know they might accuse you of stealing the bracelet.”

“We never!” wailed Dot. “We never! They gave it to us!”

“Well, they are going to take it back, so now!” Margaret Pease declared.

“I don’t think it is nice of you to say what you do, Margie,” said Tess. “Everybody knows we are honest. Why! if Dot and I knew how to find them, we would take the bracelet right to the Gypsy ladies. Wouldn’t we, Dot?”

“But – but we don’t know where to find them,” blurted out the youngest Corner House girl.

“You can find them I guess – out on the Buckshot Road.”

“We don’t know that our Gypsy ladies are there,” said Tess, with some defiance.

“You don’t dare go to see,” said Margaret Pease.

It was a question to trouble the minds of Tess and Dot. Should they try to find the Gypsies, and see if the very ladies who had given them the bracelet were in that encampment?

At least it was a leading question in Tess Kenway’s mind. It must be confessed that Dot only hoped it would prove a false alarm. She was very grateful to the strange Gypsy women for having put the silver ornament in the green and yellow basket; but she hoped never to see those two kind women again!

The uncertainty was so great in both of the small girls’ minds that they said nothing at all about it in the hearing of any other member of the family. Had Ruth been at home they might have confided in her. They had always confided everything to their eldest sister. But just now the two smaller Corner House girls were living their own lives, very much shut away from the existence Agnes, for instance, was leading.

Agnes had a secret – several of them, indeed. She did not take Tess and Dot into her confidence. So, if for no other reason, the smaller girls did not talk to Agnes about the Gypsies.

The Kenways owned some tenement property in a much poorer part of the town than that prominent corner on which the Corner House stood. Early in their coming to Milton from Bloomsburg, the Corner House girls had become acquainted with the humble tenants whose rents helped swell the funds which Mr. Howbridge cared for and administered.

Some of these poorer people, especially the children near their own age, interested the Kenway girls very much because they met these poorer children in school. So when news was brought to Agnes one afternoon (it was soon after lunch) that Maria Maroni, whose father kept the coal, wood, ice and vegetable cellar in one of the Stower houses and who possessed a wife and big family of children as well, had been taken ill, Agnes was much disturbed.

Agnes liked Maria Maroni. Maria was very bright and forward in her studies and was a pretty Italian girl, as well. The Maronis lived much better than they once had, too. They now occupied one of the upstairs tenements over Mrs. Kranz’s delicatessen store, instead of all living in the basement.

The boy who ran into the Kenway yard and told Agnes this while she was tying up the gladioli stems after a particularly hard night’s rain, did not seem to be an Italian. Indeed, he was no boy that Agnes ever remembered having seen before.

But tenants were changing all the time over there where Maria lived. This might be a new boy in that neighborhood. And, anyway, Agnes was not bothered in her mind much about the boy. It was Maria’s illness that troubled her.

“What is the matter with the poor girl?” Agnes wanted to know. “What does the doctor say it is?”

“They ain’t got no doc,” said the boy. “She’s just sick, Maria is. I don’t know what she’s got besides.”

This sounded bad enough to Agnes. And the fact that the sick girl had no medical attention was the greater urge for the Kenway girl to do something about it. Of course, Joe and his wife must have a doctor for Maria at once.

Agnes went into the house and told Mrs. McCall about it. She even borrowed the green and yellow basket from the little girls and packed some jelly and a bowl of broth and other nice things to take to Maria Maroni. The Kenways seldom went to the tenements empty-handed.

She would have taken Neale with her, only she felt that after their incipient “quarrel” of the previous morning she did not care immediately to make up with the boy. Sometimes she felt that Neale O’Neil took advantage of her easy disposition.

So Agnes went off alone with her basket. Half an hour later a boy rang the front door bell of the Corner House. He had a note for Mrs. McCall. It was written in blue pencil, and while the housekeeper was finding her reading glasses the messenger ran away so that she could not question him.

The note purported to be from Hedden, Mr. Howbridge’s butler. It said that the lawyer had been “brought home” and had asked for Mrs. McCall to be sent for. It urged expedition in her answer to the request, and it threw Mrs. McCall into “quite a flutter” as she told Linda and Aunt Sarah Maltby.

“The puir mon!” wailed the Scotch woman who before she came to the old Corner House to care for the Kenway household had been housekeeper for Mr. Howbridge himself for many years. “There is something sad happened to him, nae doot. I must go awa’ wi’ me at aince. See to the bairns, Miss Maltby, that’s the good soul. Even Agnes is not in the hoose.”

“Of course I will see to them – if it becomes necessary,” said Aunt Sarah.

Her idea of attending to the younger children, however, was to remain in her own room knitting, only occasionally going to the head of the back stairs to ask Linda if Tess and Dot were all right. The Finnish girl’s answer was always “Shure, Mum,” and in her opinion Tess and Dot were all right as long as she did not see that they were in trouble.

To tell the truth, Linda saw the smaller girls very little after Mrs. McCall hurried out of the house to take the street car for the lawyer’s residence. Once Linda observed Tess and Dot in the side yard talking to a boy through the pickets. She had no idea that the sharp-featured boy was the same who had brought the news of Maria Maroni’s illness to Agnes, and the message from Hedden to Mrs. McCall!

The boy in question had come slowly along the pavement on Willow Street, muttering to himself as he approached as though saying over several sentences that he had learned by rote. He was quite evidently a keen-minded boy, but he was not at all a trustworthy looking one.

Tess and Dot both saw him, and that he was a stranger made the little girls eye him curiously. When he hailed them they were not quite sure whether they ought to reply or not.

“I guess you don’t know us,” Tess said doubtfully. “You don’t belong in this neighborhood.”

“I know you all right,” said the boy. “You’re the two girls those women sold the basket to. I know you.”

“Oh!” gasped Tess.

“The Gypsy ladies!” murmured Dot.

“That’s the one. They sold you the basket for forty-five cents. Didn’t they?”

“Yes,” admitted Tess.

“And it’s ours,” cried Dot. “We paid for it.”

“That’s all right,” said the boy slowly. “But you didn’t buy what was in it. No, sir! They want it back.”

“Oh! The basket?” cried Tess.

“What you found in it.”

The boy seemed very sure of what he was saying, but he spoke slowly.

“They want that silver thing back. It wasn’t meant for you. It was a mistake. You know very well it isn’t yours. If you are honest – and you told them you were – you will bring it back to them.”

“Oh! They did ask us if we were honest,” Tess said faintly. “And of course we are. Aren’t we, Dot?”

“Why – why – Do we have to be so dreadful’ honest,” whispered the smallest Corner House girl, quite borne down with woe.

“Of course we have. Just think of what Ruthie would say,” murmured Tess. Then to the boy: “Where are those ladies?”

“Huh?” he asked. “What ladies?”

“The Gypsy ladies we bought the basket from?”

“Oh, them?” he rejoined hurriedly, glancing along the street with eagerness. “You go right out along this street,” and he pointed in the direction from which he had come. “You keep on walking until you reach the brick-yard.”

“Oh! Are they camped there?” asked Tess.

“No. But a man with an automobile will meet you there. He is a man who will take you right to the Gypsy camp and bring you back again. Don’t be afraid, kids. It’s all right.”

He went away then, and the little girls could not call him back. They wanted to ask further questions; but it was evident that the boy had delivered his message and was not to be cross-examined.

“What shall we do?” Tess exclaimed.

“Oh, let’s wait. Let’s wait till Ruth comes home,” cried Dot, saying something very sensible indeed.

But responsibility weighed heavily on Tess’s mind. She considered that if the Gypsy women wished their bracelet returned, it was her duty to take it to them without delay. Besides, there was the man in the automobile waiting for them.

Why the man had not come to the house with the car, or why he had not brought the two Gypsy women to the Corner House, were queries that did not occur to the little girls. If Tess Kenway was nothing else, she was strictly honest.

“No,” she sighed, “we cannot wait. We must go and see the women now. I will go in and get the bracelet, Dot. Do you want your hat? Mrs. McCall and Agnes are both away. We will have to go right over and tend to this ourselves.”

CHAPTER XXII – EXCITEMENT GALORE

When Agnes Kenway reached the tenement where Maria Maroni resided and found that brisk young person helping in the delicatessen store as she did almost every day during the busy hours and when there was no school, the Corner House girl was surprised; but she was not suspicious.

That is, she was not suspicious of any plot really aimed at the happiness of the Corner House family. She merely believed that the strange boy had deliberately fooled her for an idle purpose.

“Maria Maroni! What do you think?” Agnes burst out. “Who could that boy be? Oh, I’d like to catch him! I’d make him sorry he told me such a story.”

“It is too bad you were troubled so, Agnes,” said Maria, when she understood all about it. “I can’t imagine who that boy could be. But I am glad you came over to see us, never mind what the reason is that brings you.”

“A sight you are for sore eyes yet,” declared the ponderous Mrs. Kranz, who had kissed Agnes warmly when she first appeared. “Come the back room in and sit down. Let Ikey tend to the customers yet, Maria. We will visit with Agnes, and have some tea and sweet crackers.”

“And you must tell me of somebody in the row, Mrs. Kranz, who needs these delicacies. Somebody who is ill,” said Agnes. “I must not take them home again. And Maria looks altogether too healthy for jelly and chicken broth.”

Mrs. Kranz laughed at that. But she added with seriousness: “There is always somebody sick here in the tenements, Miss Agnes. They will not take care themselfs of – no! I tell them warm flannels and good food is better than doctors yet. But they will not mind me.” She sighed.

“Who is ill now?” asked Agnes, at once interested. She loved to play “Lady Bountiful”; and, really, the Kenway sisters had done a great deal of good among their poor tenants and others in the row.

“Mrs. Leary. You know, her new baby died and the poor woman,” said Maria quickly, “is sick of grief, I do believe.”

“Ach, yes!” cried Mrs. Kranz. “She needs the cheerful word. You see her, Miss Agnes. Then she be better – sure!”

“Thank you!” cried Agnes, dimpling and blushing. “Do you really think I can help her?”

“And there is little Susie Marowsky,” urged the delicatessen shopkeeper. “That child is fading away like a sick rose. She iss doing just that! If she could have country eggs and country milk – Ach! If we were all rich!” and she sighed ponderously again.

“I’ll tell our Ruth about her,” said Agnes eagerly. “And I’ll see her, too, before I go home. I’ll give her the broth, yes? And Mrs. Leary the jelly, bread, and fruit?”

“No!” cried Mrs. Kranz. “The fruit to Dominic Nevin, the scissors grinder. He craves fruit. You know, he cut his hand and got blood poisoning, and it was so long yet that he could not work. You see him, too, Miss Agnes.”

So altogether, what with the tea and cakes and the visits to the sick, Agnes was away from the Corner House quite three hours. When she was on her way home she was delayed by an unforeseen incident too.

At the corner of Willow Street not far from the brick-yard a figure suddenly darted into Agnes’ path. She was naturally startled by the sudden appearance of this figure, and doubly so when she saw it was the Costello that she knew as the junkman, and whose first name she now believed to be Miguel.

“What do you want? Go away!” cried the girl faintly, backing away from the vehement little man.

“Oh, do not be afraid! You are the honest Kenway I am sure. You have Queen Alma’s bracelet,” urged the little man. “You will give her to me – yes?”

“I – I haven’t it,” cried Agnes, looking all about for help and seeing nobody near.

“Ha!” ejaculated the man. “You have not give it to Beeg Jeem?”

“We have given it to nobody. And we will not let you or anybody have it until Mr. Howbridge tells us what to do. Go away!” begged Agnes.

“I go to that man. He no have the Queen Alma bracelet. You have it – ”

“Just as sure as I get home,” cried the frightened Agnes, “I will send that bracelet down to the lawyer’s office and they must keep it. It shall be in the house no longer! Don’t you dare come there for it!”

She got past him then and ran as hard as she could along Willow Street. When she finally looked back she discovered that the man had not followed her, but had disappeared.

“Oh, dear me! I don’t care what the children say. That bracelet goes into Mr. Howbridge’s safe this very afternoon. Neale must take it there for me,” Agnes Kenway decided.

She reached the side door of the Corner House just as Mrs. McCall entered the front door, having got off the car at the corner. The housekeeper came through the hall and into the rear premises a good deal like a whirlwind. She was so excited that Agnes forgot her own fright and stared at the housekeeper breathlessly.

“Is it you home again, Agnes Kenway?” cried Mrs. McCall. “Well, thanks be for that. Then you are all right.”

“Why, of course! Though he did scare me. But what is the matter with you, Mrs. McCall?”

“What is the matter wi’ me? A plenty. A plenty, I tellit ye. If I had that jackanapes of a boy I’d shake him well, so I would!”

“What has Neale been doing now?” cried the girl.

“Not Neale.”

“Then is it Sammy?”

“Nor Sammy Pinkney. ’Tis that other lad that came here wi’ a lying note tae get me clear across town for naething!”

“Why, Mrs. McCall! what can you mean? Did a boy fool you, too?”

“Hech!” The woman started and stared at the girl. “Who brought you news of that little girl being sick?”

“But she wasn’t sick!” cried Agnes. “That boy was an awful little story-teller.”

“Ye was fooled then? That Maria Maroni – ”

“Was not ill at all.”

“And,” cried Mrs. McCall, “that boy who brought a note to me from Hedden never came from Mr. Howbridge’s house at all. It nearly scar’t me tae death! It said Mr. Howbridge was ill. He isn’t even at home yet, and when Mr. Hedden heard from his master this morning he was all right – the gude mon!”

“Oh, Mrs. McCall!” gasped Agnes, gazing at the housekeeper with terrified visage. “What can it mean?”

“Somebody has foolit us weel,” ejaculated the enraged housekeeper.

“But why?”

The woman turned swiftly. She had grown suddenly pale. She called up the back stairs for Linda. A sleepy voice replied:

“Here I be, mum!”

“Where are the children? Where are Tess and Dot?” demanded Mrs. McCall, her voice husky.

“They was in the yard, mum, the last I see of them.”

“That girl!” ejaculated the housekeeper angrily. “She neglects everything. If there’s harm happened to those bairns – ”

She rushed to the porch. Uncle Rufus was coming slowly up from the garden, hoe and rake over his shoulder. It was evident that the old colored man had been working steadily, and for some time, among the vegetables.

“Oh, Uncle Rufus!” cried the excited woman.

“Ya-as’m! Ya-as’m! I’s a-comin’,” said the old man rather querulously.

“Step here a minute,” said Mrs. McCall.

“I’s a-steppin’, Ma’am,” grumbled the other. “Does seem as though dey wants me for fust one t’ing an’ den anudder. I don’t no more’n git t’roo one chore den sumpin’ else hops right out at me. Lawsy me!” and he mopped his bald brown brow with a big bandanna.

“I only want to ask you something,” said the housekeeper, less raspingly. “Are the little ones down there? Have you seen them?”

“Them chillun? No’m. I ain’t seen ’em fo’ some time. They was playin’ up this-a-way den.”

“How long ago?”

“I done reckon it was nigh two hours ago.”

“Hunt for them, Agnes!” gasped the housekeeper. “I fear me something bad has happened. You, Linda,” for the Finnish girl now appeared, “run to the neighbors – all of them! See if you can find those bairns.”

“Tess and Dottie, mum?” cried the Finnish girl, already in tears. “Oh! they ain’t losted are they?”

“For all you know they are!” declared Mrs. McCall. “Look around the house for them, Uncle Rufus. I will look inside – ”

“They may be upstairs with Aunt Sarah,” cried Agnes, getting her breath at last.

“I’ll know that in a moment!” declared Mrs. McCall, and darted within.

Agnes ran in the other direction. She felt such a lump in her throat that she could scarcely speak or breathe. The possibility of something having happened to the little girls – and with Ruth away! – cost the second Corner House girl every last bit of her self-control.

“Oh, Neale! Neale!” she murmured over and over again, as she ran to the lower end of the premises.

She fairly threw herself at the fence and scrambled to her usual perch. There he was cleaning Mr. Con Murphy’s yard.

“Neale!” she gasped. At first he did not hear her, but she drubbed upon the fence with the toes of her shoes. “Neale!”

“Why, hullo, Aggie!” exclaimed the boy, turning around and seeing her.

“Oh, Neale! Come here!”

He was already coming closer. He saw that again she was much overwrought.

“What has happened now?”

“Have you seen Tess and Dot?”

“Not to-day.”

“I – I mean within a little while? Two hours?”

“I tell you I have not seen them at all to-day. I have been busy right here for Con.”

“Then they are gone! The Gypsies have got them!”

For Agnes, without much logic of thought, had immediately jumped to this conclusion. Neale stared.

“What sort of talk is that, Agnes?” he demanded. “You know that can’t be so.”

“I tell you it is so! It must be so! They got Mrs. McCall and me out of the house – ”

“Who did?” interrupted Neale, getting hastily over the fence and taking the girl’s hand. “Now, tell me all about it – everything!”

As well as she could for her excitement and fear, the girl told the story of the boy who had brought her the false message about Maria Maroni, and then about the message Mrs. McCall had received calling her across town.

“It must be that they have kidnapped the children!” moaned Agnes.

“Not likely,” declared the boy. “The kids have just gone visiting without asking leave. In fact, there was nobody to ask. But I see that there is a game on just the same.”

He started hastily for the Corner House and Agnes trotted beside him.

“But where are Tess and Dot?” she demanded.

“How do I know?” he returned. “I want to find out if there is something else missing.”

“What do you mean?”

“That bracelet.”

“Goodness, Neale! Is it that bracelet that has brought us trouble again?”

“It looks like a plot all right to me. A plot to get you and Mrs. McCall out of the house so that somebody could slip in and steal the bracelet. Didn’t that ever occur to you?”

“Goodness me, Neale!” cried Agnes again, but with sudden relief in her voice. “If that is all it is I’ll be glad if the old bracelet is stolen. Then it cannot make us any more trouble, that is one sure thing!”

CHAPTER XXIII – A SURPRISING MEETING

Tess and Dot Kenway, with no suspicion that anything was awaiting them save the possible loss of the silver bracelet, but otherwise quite enjoying the adventure, walked hurriedly along Willow Street as far as the brick-yard. That they were disobeying a strict injunction in taking the bracelet out of the house was a matter quite overlooked at the time.

They came to the corner and there, sure enough, was a big, dusty automobile, with a big, dark man in the driver’s seat. He smiled at the two little girls and Tess remembered him instantly.

“Oh, Dot!” she exclaimed, “it is the man we saw in this auto with the young Gypsy lady when we were driving home with Scalawag from Mr. Howbridge’s the other day. Don’t you remember?”

“Yes,” said Dot, with a sigh. “I guess it is the same one. Oh, dear, me!”

For the nearer the time came to give up the silver bracelet, the worse Dot felt about it.

The big Gypsy looked around at the two little girls and smiled broadly.

“You leetle ladies tak’ ride with Beeg Jeem?” he asked. “You go to see the poor Gypsy women who let you have the fine bracelet to play with? Yes?”

“He knows all about it, Tess,” murmured Dot.

“Yes, we will give them back the bracelet,” Tess said firmly to the Gypsy man. “But we will not give it up to anybody else.”

“Get right into my car,” said Big Jim, reaching back to open the tonneau door. “You shall be taken to the camp and there find the ones who gave you the bracelet. Sure!”

There was something quite “grownupish” in thus getting into the big car all alone, and Tess and Dot were rather thrilled as they seated themselves on the back seat and the Gypsy drove them away.

Fifteen minutes or so later Agnes came to this very corner and had her unpleasant interview with Miguel Costello. But of course by that time the children were far away.

The big Gypsy drove them very rapidly and by lonely roads into a part of the country that Tess and Dot never remembered having seen before. Whenever he saw anybody on the road, either afoot or in other cars, Big Jim increased his speed and flashed by them so that there was little likelihood of these other people seeing that the two little girls were other than Gypsy girls.

He did nothing to frighten Tess and Dot. Indeed, he was so smiling and so pleasant that they enjoyed the drive immensely and came finally in a state of keen enjoyment to the camp which was made a little back from the highway.

“Well, if we have to give up the bracelet,” sighed Tess, as they got out of the car, “we can say that we have had a fine ride.”

“That is all right. But how will my Alice-doll feel when she finds out she can’t wear that pretty belt again?” said Dot.

There were many people in the camp, both men and women and children. The latter kept at a distance from Tess and Dot, but stared at them very curiously. They kept the dogs away from the visitors, too, and the little girls were glad of that.