Auld Jeremiah/Chapter 12

Archie was painting away industriously before the usual admiring group when the voice that for the last few days he had so sadly missed remarked at his elbow:

“That is excellent, Josh—much better than the others.”

He looked down smilingly. “Hello, Rosa!” he said. “I'll be with you in about twenty wags of the brush. Better wait in the shade across the street.”

“I don't mind the sun,” she answered.

“How about my color on this one?”

“Your heather is a shade too purple. You've got to consider the distance, you know. Work a little gray into it; that will give it the proper value, and suggest the atmosphere.”

“You're right, as always.” He changed his brush, and proceeded to follow her suggestion. Ailsa drew back a little to observe the effect. Archie had strictly forbidden her working with him in the city, but did not object to her passing by late in the day for a word of criticism. He had recently been stopping work at about four, and spending the rest of the day with Ailsa in the search for a small studio apartment. The girl herself, on arriving in town, had gone immediately to the house of her relative, where she found herself very thoroughly bored.

Ailsa had seen at once, from the address given her by Archie, that by an odd coincidence the locality was opposite Jeremiah Wishart's house. She had little fear of being recognized, however, even should the old man happen to be at the window, as it was not necessary for her to look in that direction. Even so, it did not seem probable that a man of Jeremiah's age and infirmity would remember her.

Withdrawing to the curb, she waited for Archie to lay in the few remaining touches. He had not yet undertaken the lettering, wishing to wait until the background should dry in. As he was toning down the overbrilliant heather, a messenger boy pushed his way up to the ladder.

“Hey, mister,” said he, “are you J. R. Jones, from the sign-paintin' concoin?”

“Yes,” Archie answered, looking over his shoulder. “What about it?”

“Then this is fer youse,” said the youngster, and handed him a note. Archie tore it open, and read as follows:

Archie whistled. “Didn't take the old man long to fix that,” he said to himself, and turned to Ailsa. “Read this, Rosa,” said he, and handed her the note.

Ailsa took it from his hand, and stepped a little clear of the group about the ladder to see what it contained. She had just finished it when there came at her elbow what sounded like the gasp of a person in pain. Ailsa glanced up quickly, and looked straight into the dark, saturnine face of David Wishart.

Archie, dabbing away at the last few touches on the blue water of the firth, had not observed the approach of his cousin, nor had David discovered the identity of the sign painter. With a pale face, and lips that trembled slightly, he was staring at Ailsa, who had shrunk slightly away from him, her cheeks colorless.

“Ailsa!” said David, in a low, tense voice. “At last”

The girl seemed unable to speak. She glanced quickly at Archie, then drew still farther away from David, who took a step toward her.

“Where have you been?” he asked, in a low voice, for some of the idlers were looking at them curiously. “Come—walk along with me.”

Ailsa did not move. David's strong hand dropped on her elbow. She wrenched her arm away, and at the same moment Archie, feeling some tension in the atmosphere, glanced sharply around. He was just in time to see David's act, and his jaw hardened. In an instant he was down off the ladder, and, pushing the idlers roughly aside, confronted David, his eyes glittering like blue steel.

“What are you doing, you bounder?” he growled. “Leave that girl alone!”

David glanced up at him, and his jaw fell. To the onlookers, he presented the perfect picture of the “masher” caught in the act

“Good God!” he exclaimed. “Now, what's the meaning”

“Pull your freight!" snapped Archie. “Get out of here—and quick!”

To David the situation was plain enough. Here was Ailsa, whom he had sought high and low, and who had apparently paused in passing to observe the maneuvers of his crazy fool of a cousin, who for some ridiculous reason had seen fit to masquerade as a sign painter. And, not satisfied with this, here he was attempting to play the rôle of champion to beauty in distress, thereby putting him—David—in the wrong. The blood flamed up into his face.

“Mind your own business, you fool!” he snarled. “Get back there and paint your beastly sign.” He turned to Ailsa. “Come!” said he, and he reached for her arm again.

The next thing of which David was conscious was of something soft and wet and sludgy shoved violently into his face. He gasped, choked, spluttered, pawing wildly at the air. His vision was blinded, and as his mouth opened in a roar of rage some vile, bristly thing was crammed into it, and a viscid fluid that smelled of turpentine was squeezed down his throat, and set him to coughing violently.

Shouts, yells, and shrieks of laughter were ringing in his ears when swat! and something struck him full on the side of the head, and deadened even the sense of hearing. Swat! and here it was again on the other side. Then a strong grip fell upon his shoulder, and a gruff voice with an Hibernian accent was saying, in tones not unmixed with mirth:

“Come, sor; ye had best get out av this befure y'are painted blue entirely. And l'ave it be a lesson to ye not to get gay with the sisther av a sign painter!”

“But, damn it! B-r-r-r!” This last an indistinguishable splutter of paint and such objurgatives as the teacher of a Bible class should certainly never use. “That man is my cousin”

“Then 'tis lucky fer you he is not a brother, or ye might be wearin' the paint pot in place av a hat. Come, sor! Move on, youse!” This last with a wave of his club at the howling crowd.

Frothing with paint and rage, David freed himself with a furious wrench of the arm, strode across the street, mounted the steps of Jeremiah's house, and, the door being opened by the butler, who had rushed out at the sound of the uproar, disappeared within. Archie looked at Ailsa, and as he did so there came from high overhead an eerie burst of sound.

He turned his eyes upward. There in the open window was old Jeremiah, rocking back and forth, and emitting such noises as might be expected of a person whose risible apparatus had been out of commission for many years.

“Good Lord!” said Archie, with a startled look. “He's laughing!”

“Who is laughing?”

“Uncle Jerry—eh, that old codger there in the window.”

He stopped short, for Ailsa's eyes were staring at him wildly.

“What did you call him?” she asked sharply. “Uncle Jerry?” She took a step nearer, and, glancing back at Patrolman Kelly, who was occupied in dispersing the crowd, asked in a low, tense voice:

“Do you mean to tell me that you are Mr. Wishart's nephew?”

Archie stared at her, and his grin faded.

“Lor' o' love! Do you know him?”

“Are you 'Archie'?”

Archie's mouth opened and shut like that of a goldfish. He seemed struggling for air. His face turned crimson.

“And are you—the—the girl?”

“Yes,” Ailsa answered slowly, “I am the girl. The girl that you wouldn't marry for four million pounds. And to think that I should have been flinging myself at your head! Oh, I shall die of shame!”

She turned on her heel, and started to walk away, but had taken only three steps when old Jeremiah's footman, who had rushed out of the house and across the street, stepped up to her side.

“Mr. Wishart's compliments, miss, and he would like to speak to you.”

“Which Mr. Wishart?” asked Archie.

“Your uncle, sir. And he would like to see you, too, Mr. Archie.”

“Oh, come, Rosa!” Archie pleaded. “Do, please, for my sake.”

“And why for your sake, sir?” she retorted angrily.

“Oh, because—hang it all, how was I to know? And you needn't be afraid of David”

“I'm not afraid of David. I'm not afraid of any of you. I hate you all!”

“Oh, come, Rosa—please!”

Ailsa hesitated for an instant, then turned, and, with a set face, walked across the street and up the steps. Her temper had the upper hand, and for an instant she asked nothing better than to tell the three Wisharts, individually and collectively, precisely what she thought of them. With Archie at her heels, she entered the house, and followed the footman up the stairs.

“Miss Graeme and Mr. Archie, sir,” said the footman, and hurriedly withdrew, coughing violently.

Ailsa, her face aflame, and her eyes flashing, entered the room. Archie, still in his paint blouse, followed, discreetly closing the door behind him. Old Jeremiah, huddled in his chair, was mopping his eyes and shaking convulsively.

“Oh, Archie, man,” he gasped, “ye have like to been the death o' me! And you, Ailsa Graeme!” His speech failed him.

Ailsa drew herself up stiffly.

“Mr. Wishart,” she began, “perhaps you may be thinking it a very funny thing”

“Oh, hush, hush, dearie!” cackled the old man. “Ye would not be grudgin' me the first laugh I've had these fifty years. Oh, oh, when David came rampin' across the street in great spangs, the face of him blue as a turkey gobbler wi' the paint”

Such a convulsion seized him that Ailsa's anger began to melt in alarm. She stepped quickly to Jeremiah's side.

“Stop it!” said she imperiously. “Do you want to have a fit?”

Jeremiah looked up at her with streaming eyes.

“There, dearie—'tis the hysterics, no less. There—let be—funny, d'ye say? It was There, let me get my breath again”

For a moment or two he struggled with his feelings, then lay back, weak and quiet, in his chair.

“A man should not let himsel' go so long without a laugh,” said he. “The humor gets dammed up like, and is apt to kill ye when it gets loose. And how did it happen that you two forgathered, and where? Sit ye down, and tell me all about it.”

Ailsa hesitated, then, at a gesture from Archie, seated herself stiffly on the edge of a chair. Archie, realizing that large things were at stake, proceeded in his quiet, pleasant voice to put the old man in thorough possession of all the facts connected with his and Ailsa's meeting, and their subsequent work together. Old Jeremiah listened with a flush on his wasted cheeks and a glow in his deep-set eyes.

“'Tis wonderful,” he muttered, when Archie had finished his recital. “'Tis more than wonderful. 'Tis providential. And so”—he glanced from one to the other—'ye have both come to a different opeenion?”

“I have,” said Archie promptly, and with an anxious look at Ailsa.

“And so have I,” she answered coldly. “I was willing to marry your nephew if he pleased me. But now, after the way I have been treated, I am wanting only to see no more of any of the Wisharts.”

“But, Rosa—Ailsa!” cried Archie imploringly, when there came a discreet rep at the door.

“What is it?” cried Jeremiah harshly.

“Mr. David Wishart wishes to know if he can see Mr. Wishart alone, sir,” said the voice of the footman.

Jeremiah glanced at the two young people. “Go through into my study beyond,” said he, “and wait until y'are sent for. I have not yet finished what I am wishin' to say.”

Ailsa hesitated for an instant, then rose, and passed through the bedroom to the study. Archie followed her, closing both doors behind them. Ailsa walked to the window, and stood looking out, her back turned to Archie.

“R—Ailsa,” said he beseechingly, “it wasn't my fault. How was I to know that you were the girl”

Ailsa turned sharply, and her clear, lovely profile was cut like a cameo against the bright light without.

“Nonsense, Josh—or Archie, or whatever your right name is,” she answered, in a hard little voice. “I'm not blaming you for that. I'm blaming myself for being such a fond, silly fool as to fling myself at your head as I have. And you knowing all the time that you were the favorite nephew of a great millionaire. No wonder you did not want to marry me, knowing as you did that you were pretty sure to inherit a great fortune one of these days. And no wonder you were content to be painting signs for a bit!”

“But, Rosa—oh, good Lord!—I didn't expect to inherit a cent. The old gentleman fired me out neck and heels. I thought I was done for, cooked, annihilated. But after 1 met you I used to lie awake nights, singing hymns of praise that I had been man enough to refuse his offer—because, you see, dear, there was always the chance of getting you some day. It was only when I came to the conclusion that you were so much too good for me that I began to get the hump.

“Rosa, you don't really, deep down in your heart, believe that I ever had it in the back of my head to make up with Uncle Jerry, and let you go for what I thought was the other girl? You can't. Haven't you got to know me any better? And couldn't you feel me loving you every second?”

Ailsa turned back to the window. Archie stepped to her side, and took her hand in his. She made a little effort to draw it away. His grasp tightened, and she let it lie.

“All I asked, sweetheart,” said Archie, “was to love you and work for you and to help you to get on. Of course, I couldn't help but hope that some day something might happen to make it possible for me to claim you for my own darling wife. But I never, never counted for an instant on Uncle Jerry. I thought that he hated me for a conceited fool. And so he did when he chucked me out.”

Ailsa was silent for a moment; then she said, in a low voice:

“I suppose you wonder why David stopped to speak to me?”

“I did, and I do yet. I never thought that he was that kind.”

“Then you must know that he is not,” said Ailsa. “I was almost as good as engaged to him.”

“Engaged to him—to—David” Archie cried, and released her hand.

She turned and looked him full in the face. “Yes,” she answered. “When you refused to have anything to do with me your uncle did not tell me anything about it, but sent David in your place. I thought that it was David he had in mind for me from the first. He was very kind and polite, and made it very easy for me, and his mother asked me out to Bonny Brae. I was there for about a fortnight—and you may be sure that David let no grass grow under his feet—when it was a question of four million pounds Stop! Where are you going?” For Archie had swung sharply on his heel.

“I'm going in there and smash his ugly, sneering”

“Josh, you're not!” She flew to his side, and seized the hand that he had laid on the knob of the door.

“Yes, I am!”

“But, Josh, no—think of your uncle!”

“Serve him right, the old crocodile! I'll—I'll spit in his face!”

“But, Josh, just stop to think”

“I've done thinking enough. He'll fire us both out, and we'll go straight down to the city hall, and get a license, and be married as quick as they can tie the knot. Let go my hand, Rosa—Ailsa”

“Oh, but, Josh, it isn't necessary.”

“What!” He gave her a startled look. Ailsa turned crimson, then burst into a laugh.

“Shame on you, sir! I mean it isn't necessary to thrash David—and spit in your uncle's face. I did it myself.”

“Spit in”

“No, no, silly! I thrashed David. I cut him across the face with my dog whip. Then Mac bit him, and we ran away. That was the day before I met you.”

“Well, upon—my—word! You cut him across the face—oh, Rosa, but I do love you! And don't you care a bit for your sign painter, who”

“I adore him! I love him nearly to death! Oh, Josh!”

{[dhr]} “Ye need not blame an auld man,” said a dry voice; and the clinging lips were torn suddenly apart. In the doorway stood old Jeremiah, on his feet, and on his face the wry, twisted expression that stood for a smile. “I ha'e knockit three times, and, gettin' no response, began to think ye had bolted again. But I see ye were more profeetably engaged. Aweel—aweel”

“Uncle Jerry!” cried Archie. “Walking, as I live!”

“Ou, aye. Yon contortions ha'e straightened the kinks oot o' my auld legs. Hoots! But we ha'e been a pack of fules—all four of us.” He chuckled, then stopped suddenly, and looked alarmed. “I'm thinkin' I maun be in my dotage, gigglin' like a lass in the school. David is gone, puir man! 'Twill tak' some days, I'm thinkin', to soak the paint out o' his seestem; but he is no so sore, though havin' fared so ill at the hands o' both o' ye.”

“And you say he's not sore about it, Uncle Jerry?”

The old man's eyes twinkled. “I dinna think so,” he answered. “Ye see, I felt I owed him somethin', so I am arrangin' to divide my fortune between him and Ailsa, owin' the lass somethin', too, for havin' saddled her wi' a ne'er-do-weel. So get ye married as fast as ever ye can, as I am wishin' to see a bairnie before I go.”

He crossed the room with tottering steps, and laid a gaunt hand on the black head and the bronze one.

“God bless and keep ye both!” said old Jeremiah.