The Carter Girls' Mysterious Neighbors

“Well!” said Miss Ella over the shoulder of her sister, who refused to give her right of way but who was silenced for the moment by shortness of breath. “Why did you come today when you wrote you were coming to-morrow?”

“I did not write I was coming tomorrow,” said Douglas, smiling in spite of herself.

“There! What did I tell you?” panted Miss Louise. “You said Tuesday, didn’t you, honey?” with ingratiating sweetness.

“No, Miss Grant, I said Wednesday.”

The incident was closed. The wrangling sisters had no more to say on the subject except to apologize for not having them met. It was explained that Billy Sutton had gone to get Mr. and Mrs. Carter, but the trunks must be sent for. Quite humbly Miss Ella went to get her farmhand to hitch up the mules to drive to the station, while Miss Louise showed the girls over the house.

Everything was in beautiful order and shining with cleanliness. The white pine floors were scrubbed until they reminded the girls of biscuit boards, and very lovely did the bright rag rugs look on these floors. The furniture was very plain with the exception of an occasional bit of fine old mahogany. A beautiful old highboy was not too proud to stay in the same room with a cheap oak dresser, and in the basement dining-room a handsome mahogany table democratically mingled with split-bottom chairs.

Miss Louise had put flowers everywhere for their reception the day before and the whole house was redolent of late roses and mignonette and citronella. An occasional whiff of carbolic acid and chloride of lime gave evidence of the indomitable practicality of Miss Ella.

Miss Louise proved very sweet and kindly when not in her sister’s presence and later on the girls found Miss Ella to be really very agreeable. Both ladies seemed to be bent on showing kindness and consideration to their tenants to make up for the mistake about their day of arrival.

Mr. and Mrs. Carter could not help thinking that the place their daughters had chosen for them to spend the winter was pretty. As they rolled up in Billy’s car the quaint house and beautiful lawn certainly presented a most pleasing aspect, and their handsome daughters were an added loveliness to the landscape as they hurried to meet their parents.

“Ah, this is great!” exclaimed Mr. Carter, taking a deep breath of the pure fresh air. “I think I shall have to have a cow and some pigs and do some fall plowing besides. Eh, Helen? You and I are to be the stay-at-homes. What do you think?”

“I think what you think, Daddy,” answered Helen, smiling happily over her father’s show of enthusiasm. Dr. Wright had told her that with returning healthy nerves would come the enthusiasm that before his illness had seemed to be part of Robert Carter’s make-up.

“How do you like it, Mumsy?” asked Douglas as she drew her arm through her mother’s.

“Very nice, I am sure, but I think it would be wiser for me to go to bed now. I am not very strong and if I can give up before I drop it would be less trouble for my family,” and Mrs. Carter took on a most plaintive accent. “A little tea and toast will be all I want for my supper.”

“Oh now, it will be too bad for you to go to bed,” said Miss Ella. “We were planning to have all of you come up to Grantly for supper.”

She and Miss Louise seemed to have agreed for once on the propriety of having their tenants to supper.

“The count is coming,” said Miss Louise, with a sentimental note in her full voice.

“The count! Who is the count?” asked Mrs. Carter with some show of animation and interest.

“He is a nobleman who has settled in our neighborhood,” said Miss Ella in a matter-of-fact tone, as though noblemen were the rule rather than the exception in her life.

“Maybe it would be possible for me to take a short rest and come to Grantly,” said Mrs. Carter, with a quickening in her pretty eyes.

At mention of the count, Billy Sutton pretended to be much occupied with his engine, but Nan noticed a slight curl on his lip as he bent over the wheel.

CHAPTER III

THE COUNT

“Isn’t it fine not to have to bother about supper?” said Helen, as she and Douglas were attempting to get some order out of the chaos of trunks that had been brought from the station and systematically put in the wrong place by the good-natured, shambling, inefficient darky who served as factotum to the Misses Grant.

Helen and Douglas had decided to take one attic room in the old house for their bedroom; Bobby was to have the other; the large chamber below them was to serve as family sitting-room; Nan and Lucy were to have the upstairs room in the new house; Mr. and Mrs. Carter the lower room; the shed room was to serve as guest chamber when needed; the dining-room was in the basement. Over the outside kitchen was another extremely low attic room that was to be the servant’s bedroom, when they got her. This room was accessible from the kitchen by a flight of primitive chicken steps, that is, accessible to the young and agile.

The two servants the Carters had had at the week-end camp had been eager to come with them to the country, but Douglas and Helen had decided that they were expensive luxuries, and as much as they hated to part with them, had determined to have a country girl, accustomed to less wages than Susan, and to do without a manservant in place of the faithful, if high-priced, Oscar. Dr. Wright had insisted that some chores were indispensable for Mr. Carter, such as chopping wood, carrying water, etc., and that gentleman was eager to assist wherever he could.

“Surely you are not going to dress up to go out to supper this evening,” said Douglas, as Helen shook out a pretty little old-rose dinner gown, a leftover from the time when the Carters purchased clothes for every occasion and for every passing style and season.

“I am going to dress suitably, but I don’t call it dressing up,” said Helen, hunting for the stockings to match the gown. “I think Father is well enough for me to wear silk stockings this evening,” she said a little wistfully. We all remember that in the first throes of agony over her father’s nervous breakdown Helen had taken an oath not to wear silk stockings until he was well. “What do you think, Douglas?”

“Of course, you goose, just so you don’t have to buy the stockings,” laughed Douglas. “I am going to wear what I have on, I can tell you that. There is a lot to do to get the beds made up and the house ready to sleep in, and I have no idea of unpacking my own trunk until tomorrow,” and Douglas unlocked the trunk that held the bed linen.

“Oh, Douglas, please put on your grey crêpe de chine! I’ll get it out for you and find your stockings and everything,” begged Helen. “I don’t think it is very respectful to our hostesses for you not to be suitably dressed.”

“Is it altogether our hostesses you are thinking about?” teased Douglas.

“Whom else should I consider?”

“How about the count?”

“Well, naturally I can’t help thinking some about a nobleman,” declared Helen frankly. “Do you fancy he is young or old, rich or poor, handsome or ugly? I am wild to see him.”

“I can’t imagine. They didn’t even say what he was a count of. I hope he is not German. I must say I’d hate to put on my best dress for a German count,” laughed Douglas.

“Why, Douglas, I wouldn’t be so biased as all that. As long as our country is neutral, I don’t think it is fair for us to take such a stand. I’d rather dress up for a German count than – than – a Russian anarchist or maybe an Australian Bushman.”

“Well, I am not pining to dress up for anybody, but if I must, I must. How about Mumsy?”

“She has already got out her black lace and is going to wear her pearls. She is trying to persuade Father into his tuxedo but I fancy he will rebel.”

“Mercy on us! I thought we would never have to dress in this out-of-the-way spot,” sighed Douglas.

“Well, I for one am glad to have a chance to dress. It seems to me we have been khakied to death all summer, and I believe people deteriorate when they stay in the same old clothes year in and year out. I could wish my old-rose had another width in it. Skirts are much broader this fall. The sleeves are quite right, though, – sleeves haven’t changed much.”

Poor Helen! It was a keen misery to her not to be in the latest style. She had a natural taste for dress and the tendency to overrate the importance of clothes had been fostered in her by her frivolous mother. Douglas, on the other hand, had a tendency to underrate the value of dress and her inclination was to be rather careless of her attire.

After much scrabbling and stirring up of trunks the whole family was dressed in what Mrs. Carter and Helen considered suitable garments, with the exception of Mr. Carter, who could not be coerced into a dinner coat.

“I can’t think that a quiet supper in the country with two old ladies who are renting us the overseer’s cottage could possibly call for formal dressing. Of course, you women know best what you want to wear, and very handsome all of you look I am sure, but you must excuse me.”

“That’s what I say!” exclaimed Bobby, putting his hands in his pockets and trying to balance himself with his feet very far apart. “Me’n Father certainly do nachelly hate clean clothes. When I gits to be growed up, I’m gonter be a barefoot tramp an’ ain’t never gonter wash nor nothin’.” Bobby was still smarting and indignant from the polishing Helen had seemed to think the occasion demanded, especially concentrating on his long-suffering ears.

“Sometimes I wisht I hadn’t never had my curls cut off. Folks weren’t near so ’ticular ’bout my yers when I had curls. They kinder hid ’em.”

“But, Bobby, when you are going to have supper with a count you must be very carefully dressed,” explained Lucy. “Counts are not just common persons like us.”

“I thank you I’m no common person,” drawled Nan. “I’m a good American and fit to dine with any count living. That’s the way Douglas and I feel. We wouldn’t have changed our dresses if Mother and Helen hadn’t made such a point of it.”

“Good for you, Nan!” and her father put his arm around her. “Of course you must dress as your mother sees fit, but don’t, for goodness’ sake, think a man, because he is a count or even a king, must be treated differently from any other gentleman of your acquaintance.”

They were on their way to Grantly, only about five minutes’ walk from the farmhouse. The sun had set in a blaze of glory but already the great October moon was doing her best to take his place. There was a hint of frost in the air and our Carters were bringing their appetites with them to grace the board of their hospitable landladies.

“I do hope Miss Ella and Miss Louise won’t quarrel all the time,” whispered Helen as they approached the imposing mansion.

“They remind me of the blue and white seidlitz powders,” said Douglas: “bound to sizzle when you mix ’em. They are so mild and gentle when they are apart and the minute they get together – whiz!”

Mrs. Carter cast a triumphant glance at her husband as they entered the parlor at Grantly. The Misses Grant were dressed in rustling black silk with old lace berthas and cuffs, and the gentleman who sprang to his feet, bringing his heels together with a click as he bowed low, was attired in a faultlessly fitting dress suit.

Helen’s questions were answered by one glance at this distinguished stranger; certainly he was young and handsome; the chances were that he was also not poor. That cut of dress suit did not go with poverty, nor did the exquisite fineness of his linen. Douglas’s question of his nationality remained to be solved. “Count de Lestis” did not give the girls a clue to the country from which this interesting person hailed.

“He does not look German,” Douglas said to herself. “He is too dark and too graceful.”

She breathed a sigh of relief that her grey crêpe de chine had not been donned in honor of a German, count or no count. When she saw that the Misses Grant evidently considered their suppers worthy to be dressed up for, she was glad she had listened to the dictates of Helen.

That young lady was looking especially charming in the old-rose gown, in spite of the fact that the skirt did not flare quite enough. Helen had a way of wearing her clothes and of arranging her hair that many a dame at Palm Beach or Newport would have given her fortune to possess.

Mrs. Carter always was at her best in a parlor and now her beauty shone resplendent, framed in black lace and pearls. Her gracious manner and bearing marked her as one whose natural place was in society. Her gift was social and it did seem a great waste that such a talent should have to be buried under the bushel of an overseer’s cottage in an out-of-the-way spot in the country, with a once prosperous husband to do the chores and a maid-of-all-work, chosen because of her cheapness and not her worth.

The Misses Grant smiled their approval over the appearance of their guests. The fact that they were two quarrelsome old sisters farming on a dwindling estate did not lessen their importance in their own eyes, and they always felt that the dignity of Grantly demanded ceremonial dressing for the evening meal.

The sisters showed no marks of having toiled through the entire afternoon to prepare the feast that they were to set before their guests. Disagreeing as they did on every subject, food was not exempt. If Miss Ella decided to make an angel’s food cake, Miss Louise must make a devil’s food cake; if one thought the whites of eggs left from the frozen custard would be well to use in a silver cake, the other simultaneously determined to have apple float, requiring whites of eggs, and then the yolks must be converted into golden cake. The consequence was that their supper table groaned with opposing dishes. Each one pressed upon the guests her own specialty, and if it so happened that Miss Ella had to serve some dish of Miss Louise’s concocting, she would do it with a deprecating air as though she were helping you to cold poison; and if Miss Louise perforce must hand you one of Miss Ella’s muffins, she would shake her head mysteriously as though to warn you against them.

One thing was apparent from the beginning and that was that the count was a good mixer. His English was perfect, except for an occasional suggestion of an interchange of b and p, and also a too great stress on his s. He was a brilliant conversationalist but had the wit not to be a monologueist. He had done much traveling for a man under thirty and had lived in so many places that it made him a real citizen of the world. Evidently he had the Misses Grant charmed. From the moment that he bought Weston, a fine old estate in the neighborhood, and came into their county to settle, the old ladies had taken him to their hearts. They seemed in danger of agreeing on the subject of this fascinating young man’s charms. However, they found something to quarrel about even in this stranger: Miss Ella thought his mouth was his best feature, while Miss Louise insisted that his eyes were.

Of course the Carters were one and all dying to know more about him: Who was he? What was his nationality? Why had he settled in America? Where were his people? Did he have a family?

He seemed to be equally curious about them. Why should city people of such breeding and beauty come and live in a little tumbledown shack in the country? He had merely been told by the Misses Grant that the tenants who had just moved into the little farmhouse were to have supper with them, when these visions of loveliness burst upon him. He couldn’t decide which one of the sisters was the most attractive. Douglas was the most beautiful with her titian hair and clear complexion, not ruined by the summer out-of-doors as her mother had feared. But Helen – there was a piquancy about Helen that was certainly very fetching; her brown hair was so beautifully arranged at exactly the right and becoming angle; her little head was so gracefully set on her athletic shoulders; her bearing was so gallant; – certainly Helen was very attractive. Then there was Nan with her soft loveliness, her great eyes now shining with excitement and now dreaming some entrancing dream. She was only sixteen but there was something about her countenance that gave promise of great cleverness. Lucy was growing more like Helen and much of Helen’s charm was hers, although the child had strong characteristics all her own.

While Count de Lestis was deciding which one of the sisters was most attractive, he did the extremely tactful and suitable thing of addressing his remarks to their mother, not forgetting to give the hostesses a full share of attention. Mr. Carter, who since his illness had been inclined to be very quiet, was drawn into the conversation and held his own with his old time power. Little wonder that his daughters were grateful to this interesting stranger who had this effect on their beloved father.

The young man told them he was Hungarian and had bought the estate of Weston with a view to entering into intensive farming.

“Then you are not Prussian!” exclaimed Douglas. “Oh, I am so glad!”

“Ah!” and his handsome eyes flashed for a moment. Then he looked amused. “And why are you so glad?”

“Why, of course anyone would be glad,” and Douglas blushed. “Who would want to have a Prussian for a neighbor?”

“Do you dislike them so much then?”

“I hate them!”

“And you, too?” turning to Helen.

“I am trying to remain neutral as our president has asked us to. I don’t feel so terribly Anglo-Saxon as my sister.”

Of course this started the question of the war, which was in the minds of everybody. Count de Lestis rather surprised Mr. Carter by his frank announcement concerning his connection with Berlin.

“I, no doubt, would be fighting with the Central Powers if I had not committed political suicide four years ago.”

“And how was that?”

“I wrote a book in which I made a plea for a democratization of Austria-Hungary. In it I intimated that the Hohenzollerns had no right to dictate to the universe. I was requested to leave the country. I was then living in Vienna, making short trips to my estate, which lies partly in Austria and partly in Hungary. Now there is danger of my entire possessions being confiscated.”

“Oh, but when Germany is finally whipped you can come into your own again,” asserted Douglas. “The outcome is merely a matter of time.”

“And so Germany is to be whipped?” his eyes flashing again.

“Of course,” said Douglas simply.

“And why of course?”

“‘Because God’s in his Heaven,’” whispered Nan, but the count heard her.

“Yes, but whose God?”

“The God of Justice and of Right.”

“How about the God of Might?”

“There is no such God,” and this time Douglas’s eyes did some flashing.

“I believe the United States will intervene before so very long,” said Mr. Carter as he and the count strolled out on the veranda to enjoy their cigars. The older man was enjoying his talk with this young foreigner. He looked forward with pleasure to seeing much of him, since Weston was only about three miles from the farm. They made plans to do some shooting together, as the open season was only a week off.

When de Lestis learned that Mr. Carter was an architect he asked him to visit him at his earliest convenience at Weston to advise with him concerning the restoration of the old house to its original grandeur.

“I’m not supposed to be doing any work for at least a year,” sighed Mr. Carter, “but I might look it over and tell you what I think and then recommend a suitable architect to take it in hand.”

Douglas and Helen had a talk with Miss Louise on the subject of a country girl to come to them as maid of all work.

“They are all of them thoroughly trifling,” declared that lady in her soft round voice, “but this creature we have has a sister who could come to you. I beg of you not to give her any more wages than ours receives, as in that case we should have to go up.”

“Certainly not,” said Douglas. “Just tell us what that is.” But on learning that it was only seven dollars a month, the girls felt that it was no wonder the creatures were thoroughly trifling.

“Did she cook this wonderful supper?” asked Helen.

“No, indeed! Ella and I always cook everything we eat and this Tempy washes the dishes and cleans.”

“But we want someone to cook. Do you think I might train the sister?”

“Well, I have heard you can train monkeys but I have never seen it done,” laughed the fat old lady. “Come with me now and we can speak to Tempy about her sister Chloe.”

They found Tempy in the pantry, peacefully sleeping in the midst of the unwashed dishes. Not in the least abashed at being caught napping, she waked up and told Helen that no doubt Chloe would be pleased fur ter come. She promised to fetch her on the morrow.

“I will pay her just what the Misses Grant pay you,” said Helen.

“Lawsamussy, missy, she ain’t wuth what I is. She ain’t nebber wucked out ter say much. I done started at six and wucked up ter seben, an’ if Chloe gits now what I gits, she’ll be too proudified. You jis’ start her at six same as Miss Ellanlouise done me.”

CHAPTER IV

GRANTLY

Since our girls were to become quite intimate with the peculiar old sisters and their home, perhaps it would be just as well for me to give my readers some idea of what Grantly was like.

The first thing that struck a visitor was the wonderful box bushes in the hedge enclosing the yard and in a labyrinth in the garden. These bushes were so thick that one could really walk on the tops of them if they were kept clipped, which they were not. In the labyrinth the bushes met overhead and even after a heavy rain the paths between were perfectly dry. It took days of soaking rain to make those winding paths wet. Beyond the labyrinth was an old-fashioned garden, but now in October chrysanthemums and late roses and cosmos were all that was left of the riot of color that could be seen there during the spring and summer.

The house was of a very peculiar architectural design: a long, low body with a tower at each end. In each tower was a square room with many windows overlooking the country for miles around. Miss Ella claimed one of these rooms as her own especial property; Miss Louise the other. To approach Miss Ella’s sanctum sanctorum it was necessary to climb a narrow spiral stairway; Miss Louise’s was more accessible by reason of a broad stairway of many landings, but the ceilings at the landings were so low that anyone of ordinary stature must stoop to ascend.

These rooms were used only as sitting-rooms by the erratic sisters as, strange to say, the two old ladies slept in the same room and in the same great four-posted tester bed. There were many other bedrooms in the mansion, but they both preferred the great chamber leading from the parlor, and there they slept and no doubt quarreled in their sleep.

“This is my sitting-room up here,” said Miss Ella as she showed her guests over the quaint old house. “You may come up if you like. I had the steps made this way so Louise can’t get up here and worry my soul out of me with her eternal chatter. She’s too fat for the spiral stairway. Elephant!”

“Yes, and my sitting-room is in the other tower, and thank goodness, Ella would find it a back-breaking job to get up my steps,” retaliated Miss Louise. “Giraffe!”

Those strange old ladies had actually had the original steps to the towers changed to suit their particular grouches! They really spent very little time in their tower fastnesses, however, as they were much happier when together and quarreling.

A tale was told in the neighborhood that once Miss Ella had neglected or forgotten to contradict Miss Louise on some vital subject such as whether it was or was not going to rain, and Miss Louise was so uneasy that she sent post haste for Dr. Allison.

“I was afraid it was a stroke or something,” whimpered Miss Louise. She worried herself into a sick headache before the doctor arrived, and then the fat one had to go to bed and take the medicine and Miss Ella was forced to repent of her misbehavior by nursing her sister. Dr. Allison left strict injunctions that she was not to worry her poor sister again by agreeing with her.

Grantly was filled with fine old furniture and all kinds of curios. A great-uncle had been a traveler in the Orient and many were the teakwood cabinets and jade ornaments; curious Japanese prints; Chinese embroidered fans and screens; bronze Buddhas; rare vases with inlaid flowers and birds; Toby jugs and lacquered teapots; quaint armor, swords and daggers; everything in fact that might be found in an old house that a traveler had once called home.