Talbot's Angles

"I believe I'm hungry," said Linda.

Phebe's face beamed. "Dat soun' lak sumpin," she declared. "Jes' wait till I fetches in dem hot rolls. Dey pipin' hot right out o' de oben. I say hongry," she murmured to herself, as she went clumsily on her errand.

The day went well enough. On her way home from school, Linda stopped to ask Bertie to spend the night with her. But Bertie was off to a birthday dance in the country, which meant she would not be back till the next morning. She was "so sorry." If she had "only known," and all that. "But, of course, you can get someone else," she concluded by saying.

"Oh, I don't mind staying alone, if it comes to that," Linda told her.

"You stay too much alone, Linda."

"And I, who am surrounded all day by such a regiment of boys."

"Oh, they don't count; I mean girls of your own age. How are you getting along, Linda, by the way?"

"Oh, well enough," responded Linda doubtfully. "The more successful I am, the more it takes it out of me, however, and I am afraid I shall really never love teaching. Even though you may succeed in an undertaking, if you don't really love it, you tire more easily than if you did something much harder, but which you really loved."

"I suppose that may be true. Well, Linda, I hope you will not always be a teacher."

"I hope not," responded Linda frankly.

"I wish you would come over oftener, and would go around more with the girls. They would all love to have you."

Linda shook her head gravely. "That is very nice for you to say, but I couldn't do it – yet."

"Well, be sure you don't stay by yourself to-night," Bertie charged her.

Linda promised, and started off to fulfil the intention. Miss Parthy, from her porch, called to her as she went by. "When's Ri coming back?" she asked, over the heads of her three dogs, who occupied the porch with her.

"Not till to-morrow morning."

"You'd better come over here and sleep," Miss Parthy advised her. "I have an extra room, you know."

"And leave dear old Mammy to her lonesome? No, I think I'd better not, Miss Parthy; thank you. I'll get someone to stay."

"You can have one of the dogs," offered Miss Parthy quite seriously. "They are better than any watchman."

Linda thanked her, but the thought of Brownie's tail thumping on the floor outside her door, or of Pickett's sharp bark, or Flora's plaintive whine, decided her. "I think I'd rather have a human girl, thank you, Miss Parthy, and even if I find no one, it will be all right; I have stayed with only Mammy in the house dozens of times."

She continued her way, stopping at the house of this or that friend, but all were bound for the birthday party, and after two or three attempts she gave it up. Rather than put any more of the good-hearted girls to the pain of refusing, she would stay alone. More than one had offered to give up the dance, and this she could not allow another to propose. After all, it would not be bad, though Mammy should drop to sleep early, for there would be the cheerful fire and another bit of paper to cover with the lines which had been haunting her all day. She turned toward home again, with thoughtful tread, traversing the long street between rows of flaming maples or golden gum trees, whose offerings of scarlet and yellow fluttered to her feet at every step. There was the first hint of winter in the air, but the grass was green in the gardens and in the still unfrosted vines birds chattered and scolded, disputing right of way.

At the corner she met Mr. Jeffreys, who joined her. "Bound for a walk?" he asked. "May I go with you?"

As a girl will, who does not despise the society of a companionable man, she tacitly accepted his escort, and they went on down the street toward the river, where the red and yellow of trees appeared to have drifted to the sky, to be reflected in the waters below.

"Miss Talbot," said the young man, when they had wandered to where houses were few and scattered, "I have a confession to make."

Linda looked at him in surprise. He was rather a reticent person, though courteous and not altogether diffident. "To me?" she exclaimed.

"To you first, because – well, I will tell you that I, too, can claim kinship with the Talbot family. My great-grandfather and yours were brothers. Did you ever hear of Lovina Talbot?"

"Why, yes. Let me see; what have I heard? It will come back to me after a while. That branch of the Talbots left here years ago."

"Yes, just after the War of 1812. My great-grandfather, Cyrus, went to Western Pennsylvania. His only daughter, Lovina, was my grandmother. She married against his wishes, and then he married a second time – a Scotch-Irish girl of his neighborhood – and the families seem to have known little of one another after that. My father, Charles Jeffreys, was Lovina's son. He settled in Hartford, Connecticut. And now you have my pedigree."

"Why, then we are really blood relations. No wonder you were interested in the old Talbot place. Why – " she paused, hesitated, flushed up – "then it must be some of the Talbot property you are looking up."

"That is it; but I don't exactly know which it is, and without proof I can make no claim, as I have often said."

Linda ran over in her mind the various pieces of property which she was aware of having belonged to the original grants. "There was a good deal of it," she said. "Some of it was sold before my father's time, and he parted with more, so now all we have is the old homestead farm. I should like to know," she continued musingly, "which place you think it really is. I suppose it must be Timber Neck, for that was the first which passed out of our hands."

"I cannot tell, for I don't know exactly."

"Why didn't you make yourself known before? Didn't you know it would have made a difference to me – to us all, if you belonged, even remotely, to one of the old families?"

"Yes, I did, I suppose; but for that very reason I was slow to confess it. I came here under rather awkward circumstances. For a time I was in a position to be looked upon with suspicion, to be considered a mere adventurer. I may be yet," he continued, with a smile and a side glance at the girl, "even if I do pay my board bills and my laundress."

"Oh, we don't think that of you; we are quite sure you are genuine," Linda hastened to assure him.

"You have only my word. You don't know who my father was."

"You just told me he was Charles Jeffreys."

"Yes, but – " He did not finish the sentence. "I thought it was due you to know something of myself and my errand."

"I am glad to know it."

"Thank you. That is very good of you. Do you mind if I ask that you do not repeat what I have been telling you?"

"Not even to Miss Ri?"

Mr. Jeffreys considered the question. "I think Miss Hill should certainly know, for she was my first friend; and Mr. Matthews, too, perhaps. I will tell them and ask them to respect my secret for the present. When I can come among you as one who has a right to claim ancestry with one of your Eastern Shore families, that will be a different thing."

Linda would like to have asked for more of his personal history and, as if reading her thought, he went on: "I have not had a wildly-adventurous life; it has been respectably commonplace. I had a fair education, partly in Europe; but I am not college-bred. My father was a gentleman, but not over-successful in business. He left only a life insurance for my mother, enough for her needs, if used with care. My mother died two years ago, and I have neither brother nor sister."

Linda's sympathy went out. "Neither have I brother nor sister," she returned softly. "I can understand just how lonely you must be. But you know you have discovered a cousin, and you may consider it a real relationship."

The young man cast her a grateful look. "That makes me feel much less of an alien. I am afraid an outsider would not meet with such graciousness up our way."

"But you must not call me cousin," said Linda, "or we shall have your secret public property, and that will never do." Her sweet eyes were very tenderly bright, and the gentle curve of her lips suggested a smile.

"She is much prettier than I thought," the young man told himself. "She has always looked so pale and unresponsive, I thought she lacked animation; but when one sees – I beg your pardon," he was roused by Linda's speaking. "Oh, yes; it is getting on to supper time, I am afraid. Perhaps we'd better turn back."

They returned by the river walk, parting at Miss Ri's gate. "Good-night, cousin," said Linda, "and good luck to you."

The walk had stirred her blood, the talk had roused a new and romantic interest in her companion, and the same song which Phebe had heard in the morning was on her lips as she entered the house.

Phebe was on the watch for her. "Ain't nobody comin' to eat suppah with yuh?" she inquired.

"No; the girls are all off to a dance in the country. I don't need anyone, Mammy. You and I have been alone many a time before this, and it will seem like old times."

Mammy looked at her critically. "Yuh sholy is beginnin' to git some roses in yo' cheeks," she said. "Whar yuh been?"

"Just around town a little, and then I took a walk by the river."

"By yose'f? Who dat come to de gate wi' yuh?"

"You prying old Mammy. I believe you could see even around the corner. That was Mr. Jeffreys."

"Dat bo'ds wi' Miss Parthy an' feeds de chickens?"

"That is the one."

"Humph!" Mammy's tones expressed contempt. Who was he to be gallanting her young lady around town? But she knew better than to follow up her expressive ejaculation with any spoken comment, and went in without another word.

It was a quiet, cosey evening that Linda spent. It being Friday, there were no lessons to be considered for the morrow, and so she smiled over her own scribbling or smiled into the fire when pleasant thoughts possessed her. At the end of the evening, there was a carefully-copied contribution, which was ready to go to a weekly paper; but so precious was it, that it must not be trusted to remain on the sitting-room table, but must be carried upstairs until, with her own hand, she could take it to the postoffice.

As she went to her window to draw down the shades, a handful of pebbles clicked against the pane. She raised the sash and looked out. "I'm making the rounds," said a voice from below. "Good-night." And through the dimness she saw Wyatt Jeffreys' tall figure tramping around the corner of the house.

"That is nice of him," she said to herself. "Poor fellow, I hope he does recognize that I don't mean to be offish. I am sure he is proving his own cousinly consideration."

CHAPTER IX

THE LETTERS ON THE TRUNK

Miss Ri arrived betimes that Saturday morning. She was in high glee and declared she had made the luckiest bid yet, for her "old horse" proved to be a box of books. "Not bad ones, either," she declared, "and those I have duplicates of, I can give away at Christmas. The box was certainly well worth the two dollars I paid for it."

"New books, are they?" Linda inquired.

"Quite new, and it looks as if they had been selected for someone's library. We'll have a good time looking them over when they get here. Here's something else for your consideration, Linda: Berk Matthews went with me. He is the greatest one to tease. I met him on the street and couldn't get rid of him. I didn't want him to go to the sale, but the more I tried to shake him off, the more determined he was to stay with me, and finally I had to let him go along. Well, he became interested, too. Oh, I have a joke on him. He bought a trunk."

"A trunk?"

"Yes, a nice little compact trunk, which he says will be just the thing for him to take when he goes off with Judge Baker. It has the letters J. S. D. on it, which Berk declares mean 'Judge Some Day,' and he doesn't mean to change them. He is a nonsensical creature."

"What is in the trunk?"

"Oh, he hadn't opened it; for, of course, he had no key. He was in a hurry to see his mother and sister, and didn't want to bother with the trunk then. He is going to stay over till Sunday. That is a good son, Verlinda. I wish you could see the beautiful little desk he bought for his mother's birthday. I went with him to pick it out. It is on account of the birthday that he went up to the city. I am firmly convinced that he will not marry until he can give his mother just as much as he gives his wife."

"That would be expecting a little too much, wouldn't it?"

"Not from Berk's present point of view. Nothing is too good for that mother of his, and when Margaret was married, well, no girl in town could have had a better outfit. I don't believe Berk has had even a new necktie since."

"Then I'll crochet him one for a Christmas gift," said Linda smiling. "What color would you suggest?"

"A dull blue would be becoming to his style of beauty."

"Not much beauty there."

"Not exactly beauty, maybe, but Berk looks every inch a man."

"And not any superfluous inches, unless you measure his shoulders and take him in square measure."

"Well, Verlinda, you must admit he has a fine, honest face."

"So has Brownie, Miss Parthy's setter."

"That is just like a foolish girl. I'll venture to say you think Mr. Jeffreys much better looking."

"Far handsomer. By the way – no, I'll not tell you; I'll let him do that."

"You rouse my curiosity. Tell me."

"I don't need to, for here comes the young man himself."

Mr. Jeffreys was seen coming up between the borders of box which led from Miss Parthy's back fence to Miss Ri's back door. He skirted the chrysanthemum beds, and came around to the front door, Miss Ri watching him the while. "Berk would have bolted in through the kitchen," she commented. "I don't suppose anything would induce Mr. Jeffreys to be seen coming in the back door. I am surprised that he did as much as to come in through the garden." She went to the door to meet him.

Conscious of his lack of ceremony, Mr. Jeffreys began to apologize at once. "I hope you will pardon my taking the short cut, Miss Hill; but I promised Miss Turner that I would deliver this note into your hands before the ink had time to dry."

"I should be much less inclined to forgive you, if you had taken the long way around," replied Miss Ri. "Come in, Mr. Jeffreys, and let us see what this weighty matter is."

He followed her into the sitting-room, where Linda was watering some house-plants lately brought in. "Here, Verlinda, you entertain Mr. Jeffreys while I answer this note," said Miss Ri. "It's about a church meeting, and Parthy thinks I don't know, or haven't made up my mind to go, or something. I shall have to relieve her mind."

Mr. Jeffreys drew near to Linda at the window. "I hope you slept without fear of robbers," he said.

She looked up smiling. "Oh, yes. I felt very safe after your examination of bolts and bars." She went on with her task, nipping off a dead leaf here, straightening a bent twig there. "They don't look very well, yet," she said. "It takes plants some time to become used to a change of habitation."

"Like some people," he returned.

She gave him an understanding nod. "Yes, but just as surely they will thrive under proper treatment."

Miss Ri left her desk and came toward them. "I'm not going to ask you to deliver this, Mr. Jeffreys, for I want to send Parthy a lemon pie that Phebe has just baked, and I'd never trust a man to carry a lemon pie. Just sit down and I'll be back in a moment."

"Are you going to tell her?" asked Linda, when the door had closed after Miss Ri.

"Maybe. It will depend. I won't force the information."

"Get her to tell you about her trip to town; she is so funny about it."

"Miss Hill, you are to tell me about your trip to town," began Mr. Jeffreys when Miss Ri returned.

"I shall not do it," she declared. "What do you mean, Verlinda Talbot, by trying to get me to tell my secrets?"

"Maybe if you do, Mr. Jeffreys will tell you one of his."

"In that case, we must make a compact. Can you keep a secret, Mr. Jeffreys?"

"I have kept my own, so far."

"But another's is quite a different matter."

"I will keep yours, if you will keep mine."

"Then it is a bargain. Well, then, I have a fad for buying 'old horse.' You don't know what 'old horse' is? It's the stuff the express companies collect in the course of some months. If persons refuse to pay expressage, if the address is wrong, if it has been torn off, you see how it would be, they have a sale, an auction. I enjoy the fun of buying 'a pig in a poke.' Sometimes it turns out a nice fat pig and sometimes it doesn't."

"And this time?"

"It was a nice fat one. I became the possessor of a box of really good and desirable books. Perhaps I shouldn't be so ready to tell, if Berk Matthews hadn't been along; but I'm quite sure he will think it too good a story on me not to tell it. But I have one on him, too. He bid for a trunk, and it was knocked down to him."

"A trunk? You know I am interested in stray trunks. If mine had been sent by express, I'd be very keen about it."

"How was yours sent?"

"A local expressman was to take it to the steamer and I was unable to identify him when the trunk didn't turn up. I had his claim check, but that was in the pocket-book of which I was robbed – so you see – There was a tag on the trunk, but that might have been torn off. Well, let's hear about Mr. Matthew's trunk. It's rather interesting, this, and may give me a clue to mine."

"My dear young man, I fear a dishonest driver is what is wrong in your direction, or your trunk may have been stolen from the wagon, or have fallen off. However, that is an old subject, isn't it? Mr. Matthews' is a neat little steamer trunk, of rather an old fashion. Of course, he has no key, and had no time to get a locksmith, so we don't know the contents."

"Mine was a small steamer trunk, not of a new fashion. It had been my mother's; but, being small and in good condition, I used it for myself, old as it was. It had her initials on it, for she had it before she was married."

Miss Ri leaned forward and asked earnestly: "What were they?"

"J. S. D. Julia Somers Darby was her maiden name."

Miss Ri looked at him excitedly. "J. S. D.? My dear man, those are the very initials on Berk's trunk."

It was Mr. Jeffreys' turn to look agitated. "Miss Hill, are you sure? Do you think – ?" he began. "Miss Hill, could it be possible that it is my trunk? Will you tell me all the details? Where is this place that you found it? Perhaps, though, I'd best see Matthews."

"But he has not yet come back."

"True; I had forgotten that."

"I can tell you where the place is," continued Miss Ri, "if it will do any good," and she proceeded to describe the locality, Mr. Jeffreys listening intently.

"It is well worth looking into," he decided. "I don't suppose there is any chance of my catching Mr. Matthews in town before he leaves?"

"There is no boat up to-night, you know."

"That is so. I did not remember that this was Saturday."

"Moreover, if you were to take the train, very likely he would have left by the time you could reach the city. Better possess your soul in patience, Mr. Jeffreys, and wait till he gets back."

"I have been patient for some time," he responded quietly.

"To be sure, you have; so that twenty-four hours longer will not seem impossible. It certainly is a curious coincidence, though doubtless there are other steamer trunks bearing the initials J. S. D."

"Yes, I admit that; and how mine could have found its way to the express office is another puzzle."

"I shouldn't bother much about the how, if you discover that it really did reach there."

There was a pause for a moment, then Linda said: "You haven't told Aunt Ri your secret yet, cousin."

Miss Ri wheeled around in her chair. "Cousin! What are you talking about, Verlinda Talbot?"

"Our great-grandfathers were brothers, Miss Hill," said Mr. Jeffreys. "It doesn't give a very near relationship, I admit, but there it is and we are of the same blood."

"Well, I am astonished. Tell me all about it, right away. Your great-grandfather on the Talbot side, is it, Verlinda? Yours was Madison, and who was yours, Mr. Jeffreys?"

"Cyrus, whose daughter Lovina married Wyatt Jeffreys, after whom I am named. My grandfather that was, you see."

"And that is why the name always sounded so familiar," exclaimed Linda. "I am sure I have heard my grandmother speak of him, for you see, Lovina would be her husband's first cousin. Go on, please, Mr. Jeffreys."

"Very well. After the War of 1812, Cyrus Talbot removed to Western Pennsylvania. I believe his house was burned during that war, and he, like many others, was seized with the spirit of emigration to the West."

"The old house at Talbot's Addition was burned, you remember," cried Linda, turning to Miss Ri, "though I don't know just when." She turned again to Mr. Jeffreys.

"Lovina married a young Englishman," he continued. "In those days the feeling was very bitter against the English, and her father refused to see her; but after his death an old box of papers came into her possession, and they were found to be his. He had married a second time, but there were no children by this marriage. By his will, Cyrus Talbot left most of his property in Western Pennsylvania to his wife, but a clause of the will read: 'The remainder of my property to my daughter Lovina.' A little farm in that part of the country to which he emigrated was supposed to be all that came to Lovina, but the old papers show, we believe, that he still had a claim to estates here in Maryland. Lovina went to England after her marriage, and the papers were left with some of the neighbors, though she seems to have had possession of them afterward, for there was a memorandum giving the name and address of the persons in whose care it was eventually left. This memorandum my father found after her death, and when he came to this country later on, he hunted up the box and told me several times that there might be something in those papers if one had time or would take the trouble to look them over. He settled in Hartford and died there. My father left a life insurance which was sufficient for my mother's needs and which has descended to me now that she is gone. I have not studied a profession, but had a clerkship, which seemed to promise little future, and after thinking over the situation, I determined to make a break, come down here and see if there were really anything to be done about that property."

He concluded his story. Miss Ri sat drumming on the arms of her chair, as was her habit when thinking deeply. Linda, no less preoccupied, sat with eyes fixed upon the plants in the window. It was she who broke the silence. "It must be Talbot's Addition," she decided; "but, oh, what a snarl for the lawyers."

"It certainly will be," agreed Miss Ri, with a little laugh. "My dear man, I am thinking the game will not be worth the candle. However, we shall see. If Berk takes up your case, you may be sure of honest dealing, at least. He little knows what his purchase has brought about."

Yet it was not at the end of twenty-four hours that Wyatt Jeffreys received the assurance he hoped for, though he sought the Jackson House immediately upon the arrival of the morning boat. Mr. Matthews was not there. Had he arrived? Oh, yes; he came in on the train the night before, but went off again with Judge Baker first thing in the morning. When would he be back? Not for some time. He took a trunk with him, and would be making the circuit with the judge.

Therefore Wyatt Jeffreys turned disappointedly away. He went directly to Miss Ri, who observed him walking so dejectedly up the gravelled path, that she went out on the porch to meet him.

"Wasn't it your trunk?" she began. "I had worked myself quite into the belief that it must be, so I am not ready for a disappointment."

"It is not exactly disappointment, but only hope deferred," was the reply. "Mr. Matthews came last night, but went off early this morning with Judge Baker."

"Pshaw! that is trying, isn't it? However, we must make the best of it. Perhaps he didn't take the trunk."

"He took a trunk."

"I wonder if he started from the Jackson House or his office? We might make a tour of investigation. Just wait till I look to one or two things, and then we'll see what can be done."