Parnassus on Wheels (13 page)

"Where are you?" (His voice sounded cross.)

"Andrew, is there any—any message from Mr. Mifflin? That wreck
yesterday—he might have been on that train—I've been so
frightened; do you think he was—hurt?"

"Stuff and nonsense," said Andrew. "If you want to know about
Mifflin, he's in jail in Port Vigor."

And then I think Andrew must have been surprised. I began to laugh
and cry simultaneously, and in my agitation I set down the receiver.

My first impulse was to hide myself in some obscure corner where I
could vent my feelings without fear or favour. I composed my face
as well as I could before leaving the 'phone booth; then I sidled
across the lobby and slipped out of the side door. I found my way
into the stable, where good old Peg was munching in her stall. The
fine, homely smell of horseflesh and long-worn harness leather went
right to my heart, and while Bock frisked at my knees I laid my head
on Peg's neck and cried. I think that fat old mare understood me.
She was as tubby and prosaic and middle-aged as I—but she loved the
Professor.

Suddenly Andrew's words echoed again in my mind. I had barely
heeded them before, in the great joy of my relief, but now their
significance came to me. "In jail." The Professor in jail! That was
the meaning of his strange disappearance at Woodbridge. That little
brute of a man Shirley must have telephoned from Redfield, and when
the Professor came to the Woodbridge bank to cash that check they
had arrested him. That was why they had shoved me into that mahogany
sitting-room. Andrew must be behind this. The besotted old fool! My
face burned with anger and humiliation.

I never knew before what it means to be really infuriated. I could
feel my brain tingle. The Professor in jail! The gallant, chivalrous
little man, penned up with hoboes and sneak thieves suspected of
being a crook... as if I couldn't take care of myself! What did they
think he was, anyway? A kidnapper?

Instantly I decided I would hurry back to Port Vigor without delay.
If Andrew had had the Professor locked up, it could only be on the
charge of defrauding me. Certainly it couldn't be for giving him a
bloody nose on the road from Shelby. And if I appeared to deny the
charge, surely they would have to let Mr. Mifflin go.

I believe I must have been talking to myself in Peg's stall—at
any rate, just at this moment the stableman appeared and looked
very bewildered when he saw me, with flushed face and in obvious
excitement, talking to the horse. I asked him when was the next
train to Port Vigor.

"Well, ma'am," he said, "they say that all the local trains is held
up till the wreck at Willdon's cleared away. This being Sunday, I
don't think you'll get anything from here until to-morrow morning."

I reflected. It wasn't so awfully far back to Port Vigor. A flivver
from the local garage could spin me back there in a couple of
hours at the most. But somehow it seemed more fitting to go to the
Professor's rescue in his own Parnassus, even if it would take
longer to get there. To tell the truth, while I was angry and
humiliated at the thought of his being put in jail by Andrew, I
couldn't help, deep down within me, being rather thankful. Suppose
he had been in the wreck? The Sage of Redfield had played the part
of Providence after all. And if I set out right away with Parnassus,
I could get to Port Vigor—well, by Monday morning anyway.

The good people of the Moose Hotel were genuinely surprised at
the hurry with which I dispatched my lunch. But I gave them no
explanations. Goodness knows, my head was full of other thoughts and
the apple sauce might have been asbestos. You know, a woman only
falls in love once in her life, and if it waits until she's darn
near forty—well, it
takes!
You see I hadn't even been vaccinated
against it by girlish flirtations. I began to be a governess when
I was just a kid, and a governess doesn't get many chances to be
skittish. So now when it came, it hit me hard. That's when a woman
finds herself—when she's in love. I don't care if she
is
old or
fat or homely or prosy. She feels that little flutter under her ribs
and she drops from the tree like a ripe plum. I didn't care if Roger
Mifflin and I were as odd a couple as old Dr. Johnson and his wife,
I only knew one thing: that when I saw that little red devil again I
was going to be all his—if he'd have me. That's why the old Moose
Hotel in Bath is always sacred to me. That's where I learned that
life still held something fresh for me—something better than baking
champlain biscuits for Andrew.

That Sunday was one of those mellow, golden days that we New
Englanders get in October. The year really begins in March, as
every farmer knows, and by the end of September or the beginning of
October the season has come to its perfect, ripened climax. There
are a few days when the world seems to hang still in a dreaming,
sweet hush, at the very fulness of the fruit before the decline
sets in. I have no words (like Andrew) to describe it, but every
autumn for years I have noticed it. I remember that sometimes at
the farm I used to lean over the wood pile for a moment just before
supper to watch those purple October sunsets. I would hear the sharp
ting of Andrew's little typewriter bell as he was working in his
study. And then I would try to swallow down within me the beauty
and wistfulness of it all, and run back to mash the potatoes.

Peg drew Parnassus along the backward road with a merry little
rumble. I think she knew we were going back to the Professor.
Bock careered mightily along the wayside. And I had much time for
thinking. On the whole, I was glad; for I had much to ponder. An
adventure that had started as a mere lark or whim had now become for
me the very gist of life itself. I was fanciful, I guess, and as
romantic as a young hen, but by the bones of George Eliot, I'm sorry
for the woman that never has a chance to be fanciful. Mifflin was
in jail; aye, but he might have been dead and—unrecognizable! My
heart refused to be altogether sad. I was on my way to deliver him
from durance vile. There seemed a kinship between the season and
myself, I mused, seeing the goldenrod turning bronze and droopy
along the way. Here was I, in the full fruition of womanhood, on the
verge of my decline into autumn, and lo! by the grace of God, I had
found my man, my master. He had touched me with his own fire and
courage. I didn't care what happened to Andrew, or to Sabine Farm,
or to anything else in the world. Here were my hearth and my
home—Parnassus, or wherever Roger should pitch his tent. I dreamed
of crossing the Brooklyn Bridge with him at dusk, watching the
skyscrapers etched against a burning sky. I believed in calling
things by their true names. Ink is ink, even if the bottle is marked
"commercial fluid." I didn't try to blink the fact that I was in
love. In fact, I gloried in it. As Parnassus rolled along the road,
and the scarlet maple leaves eddied gently down in the blue October
air, I made up a kind of chant which I called

Hymn for a Middle-Aged Woman (Fat)
Who Has Fallen into Love

O God, I thank Thee who sent this great adventure my way!
I am grateful to have come out of the barren land of
spinsterhood, seeing the glory of a love greater than myself.
I thank Thee for teaching me that mixing, and kneading, and
baking are not all that life holds for me. Even if he doesn't
love me, God, I shall always be his.

I was crooning some such babble as this to myself when, near
Woodbridge, I came upon a big, shiny motor car stranded by the
roadside. Several people, evidently intelligent and well-to-do,
sat under a tree while their chauffeur fussed with a tire. I was
so absorbed in my own thoughts that I think I should have gone
by without paying them much heed, but suddenly I remembered the
Professor's creed—to preach the gospel of books in and out of
season. Sunday or no Sunday, I thought I could best honour Mifflin
by acting on his own principle. I pulled up by the side of the road.

I noticed the people turn to one another in a kind of surprise, and
whisper something. There was an elderly man with a lean, hard-worked
face; a stout woman, evidently his wife; and two young girls and a
man in golfing clothes. Somehow the face of the older man seemed
familiar. I wondered whether he were some literary friend of
Andrew's whose photo I had seen.

Bock stood by the wheel with his long, curly tongue running in and
out over his teeth. I hesitated a moment, thinking just how to
phrase my attack, when the elderly gentleman called out:

"Where's the Professor?"

I was beginning to realize that Mifflin was indeed a public character.

"Heavens!" I said. "Do you know him, too?"

"Well, I should think so," he said. "Didn't he come to see me last
spring about an appropriation for school libraries, and wouldn't
leave till I'd promised to do what he wanted! He stayed the night
with us and we talked literature till four o'clock in the morning.
Where is he now? Have you taken over Parnassus?"

"Just at present," I said, "Mr. Mifflin is in the jail at Port Vigor."

The ladies gave little cries of astonishment, and the gentleman
himself (I had sized him up as a school commissioner or something
of that sort) seemed not less surprised.

"In jail!" he said. "What on earth for? Has he sandbagged somebody
for reading Nick Carter and Bertha M. Clay? That's about the only
crime he'd be likely to commit."

"He's supposed to have cozened me out of four hundred dollars," I
said, "and my brother has had him locked up. But as a matter of fact
he wouldn't swindle a hen out of a new-laid egg. I bought Parnassus
of my own free will. I'm on my way to Port Vigor now to get him out.
Then I'm going to ask him to marry me—if he will. It's not leap
year, either."

He looked at me, his thin, lined face working with friendliness. He
was a fine-looking man—short, gray hair brushed away from a broad,
brown forehead. I noticed his rich, dark suit and the spotless
collar. This was a man of breeding, evidently.

"Well, Madam," he said, "any friend of the Professor is a friend of
ours." (His wife and the girls chimed in with assent.) "If you would
like a lift in our car to speed you on your errand, I'm sure Bob
here would be glad to drive Parnassus into Port Vigor. Our tire will
soon be mended."

The young man assented heartily, but as I said before, I was bent
on taking Parnassus back myself. I thought the sight of his own
tabernacle would be the best balm for Mifflin's annoying experience.
So I refused the offer, and explained the situation a little more
fully.

"Well," he said, "then let me help in any way I can." He took a
card from his pocket-book and scribbled something on it. "When you
get to Port Vigor," he said, "show this at the jail and I don't
think you'll have any trouble. I happen to know the people there."

So after a hand-shake all round I went on again, much cheered by
this friendly little incident. It wasn't till I was some way along
the road that I thought of looking at the card he had given me. Then
I realized why the man's face had been familiar. The card read quite
simply:

RALEIGH STONE STAFFORD
The Executive Mansion,
Darlington.

It was the Governor of the State!

I couldn't help chuckling, as Parnassus came over the brow of the
hill, and I saw the river in the distance once more. How different
all this was from my girlhood visions of romance. That has been
characteristic of my life all along—it has been full of homely,
workaday happenings, and often rather comic in spite of my best
resolves to be highbrow and serious. All the same I was something
near to tears as I thought of the tragic wreck at Willdon and the
grief-laden hearts that must be mourning. I wondered whether the
Governor was now returning from Willdon after ordering an inquiry.

On his card he had written: "Please release R. Mifflin at once
and show this lady all courtesies." So I didn't anticipate any
particular trouble. This made me all the more anxious to push on,
and after crossing the ferry we halted in Woodbridge only long
enough for supper. I drove past the bank where I had waited in the
anteroom, and would have been glad of a chance to horsewhip that
sneaking little cashier. I wondered how they had transported the
Professor to Port Vigor, and thought ironically that it was only
that Saturday morning when he had suggested taking the hoboes to
the same jail. Still I do not doubt that his philosophic spirit
had made the best of it all.

Woodbridge was as dead as any country town is on Sunday night.
At the little hotel where I had supper there was no topic of
conversation except the wreck. But the proprietor, when I paid
my bill, happened to notice Parnassus in the yard.

"That's the bus that pedlar sold you, ain't it?" he asked with
a leer.

"Yes," I said, shortly.

"Goin' back to prosecute him, I guess?" he suggested. "Say, that
feller's a devil, believe
me
. When the sheriff tried to put the
cuffs on him he gave him a black eye and pretty near broke his
jaw. Some scrapper fer a midget!"

My own brave little fighter, I thought, and flushed with pride.

The road back to Port Vigor seemed endless. I was a little nervous,
remembering the tramps in Pratt's quarry, but with Bock sitting
beside me on the seat I thought it craven to be alarmed. We rumbled
gently through the darkness, between aisles of inky pines where the
strip of starlight ran like a ribbon overhead, then on the rolling
dunes that overlook the water. There was a moon, too, but I was
mortally tired and lonely and longed only to see my little Redbeard.
Peg was weary, too, and plodded slowly. It must have been midnight
before we saw the red and green lights of the railway signals and I
knew that Port Vigor was at hand.