Chapter 15

As soon as Amarilly had been deposited at her door, Colette tore a leaf from the tablet reposing in its silver case, hastily wrote a few lines, and then ran her brougham at full speed back to St. Mark's. A chorister was just coming out.

"Walter!" she called.

The lad came down to the curb.

"Will you please take this to Mr. Meredith? He is probably in the Sunday-school now."

"Sure. Will you wait for an answer, Miss King?".

"No, thank you, Walter."

She rode home and waited anxiously for the personal answer to her note, which came with most unclerical alacrity.

"Colette," he said, his voice tense, "if you knew what your little note meant! Did--"

"Wait until I explain, John. I must tell you about the surplice."

She repeated Amarilly's account of the peregrinations of the robe.

"Well?" he asked bewildered, "I don't see what that has to do with--"

"Everything. There was something of mine--" she turned a deep crimson--"in the pocket of that surplice."

"Yours! Why, how did it get there, Colette? Was it--"

"I am not going to tell you--not until I have it back. Oh, I could die of shame when I think who may have found it. You must get it."

"Colette," he answered gravely, "the surplice must have passed through many hands, but if it is possible to trace this--article, I will do so. Still, how can I make inquiries unless I know what it is?"

"You can ask them, each and all, if they found anything in the pocket," she replied. "And you must tell them you left it there."

"And you won't trust me, Colette? Not after my long unhappy summer. And won't you give me an answer now to the note I wrote you last spring?"

"No; I won't tell you anything! Not until you find that."

"Be reasonable, Colette."

His choice of an adjective was most unfortunate for his cause. It was the word of words that Colette detested; doubtless because she had been so often entreated to cultivate that quality.

"I will not," she answered, "if to tell you is being reasonable. I must have it back. I think no one will really know to whom it belongs, though they may guess. You must, assume the ownership."

"I certainly shall, if it can be found," he assured her.

Seeing the utter futility of changing her mood, he took his departure; perhaps a little wiser if not quite so sad as he had been before he saw her. The next morning he called upon Amarilly, whom he found alone with Iry.

"I am very sorry to learn that you had such a hard summer," he said kindly, "and I regret that I didn't know more about your affairs before I left the city, but I was too absorbed, I fear, in my own troubles."

"How did you hear about us?" she asked curiously.

"From Miss King."

"Oh," said Amarilly happily, imagining that their trouble must have been patched up. Then another thought occurred to her which gave her a little heart palpitation. With intense anxiety depicted on her lineaments she asked tremulously: "Did she tell you about the surplus?"

"Amarilly," and the tone was so reassuring that the little wrinkles of anxiety vanished, "when I gave you the surplice, I gave it to you unconditionally, and I am very glad that you put it to profit. But, you know, as Miss King told you, that there was something of value--of importance--in that pocket; something that must be found. My happiness depends entirely upon its recovery. Now, she tells me that you can give me the names and addresses of all the people through whose hands it passed."

"Sure thing!" she replied with business-like alacrity. "You see the Boarder has been larnin' me bookkeepin', and so I keep all our accounts now in a big book the grocer give me."

She produced a large, ledger-like book and laid it on the table for his inspection. He examined her system of bookkeeping with interest. Under the head of "Cr.," which she explained to him meant "brung in," was "Washins," "Boarder," "Flamingus," "Milt," "Bobby," "Bud." Below each of these subheads were dates and accounts. The page opposite, headed "Dr.," she translated, "means paid out."

She turned a few leaves, and in big letters he read the word "Surplus."

"This bein' a sort of extry account, the Boarder said to run it as a special and keep it seprut. If you'll set down, I'll read offer to you whar it has went."

She began to read laboriously and slowly from the book, adding explanatory notes in glib tones.

"'July 8. Mister Carrul, tenner, 1 doller. Pade.' He's the tenor, you know, to Grace Church. He wanted it to sing in at a sacred concert. His was too short or too long.

"'July 11. Miss Lyte and Miss Bobson. 'Tablos. 1 doller. Pade.' Mr. Carul knows where they live. 'Twaz him as got the job fer me.

"'July 15 to July 19. The Beehive. 3 dollers and 1/2 Pade.' That's a bargain store down in our parts. I went in fer to git Bud a cap and I hearn the clerk askin' the boss about fixin' up a winder show with wax figgers fer a weddin'. I step up to him and ask him if he kep surpluses, and he sez as he didn't. I told him I could rent him one to put on the minister, and he hedn't thought fer to hev it an Episcopal show, but he sed he'd do it fer an ad fer his white goods. He wouldn't stand fer no dollar a day. He beat me down to three-fifty, but he throwed in a cap fer Bud.

"Next come Mrs. Hudgers. I didn't put it down in the ledger, though, cause it didn't bring nuthin' but a pan of doughnuts. Her son Hallie died, and he didn't hev no nice clo'es ter be laid out in, and she was agoin' to hev quite a funyral, so jest afore folks come, she slipped the surplus on ter him over his old clo'es, and then when 'twas over, she took it offen him again. He made a swell lookin' corpse. Bein' a neighbor we didn't go fer to ask her nuthin', but she give us the nut cakes. They give her dyspepsy, anyhow."

The muscles of John Meredith's face grew rigid in his endeavor to maintain a serious expression. He had taken out a notebook at the beginning of the interview to jot down the addresses, but he copied Amarilly's comments as well, for the future entertainment of Colette.

"'July 25 and 26. Mr. Derry Phillips, The Navarre. 2 dollers. Pade.' He paints picters. He painted the surplus onto a man playin' on a orgin."

She hesitated a moment, and then continued: "I'm agoin' to work reg'lur fer him instead of to the theayter. I'm agoin' to git his breakfast and clean his rooms. He'll pay me the same as I got. He's a sort of eddicatin' me too."

"Why, how is that, Amarilly?" asked John in perplexity.

"He larnt me not to say 'et' and 'kin.'"

The rector's eyes twinkled.

"And," pursued Amarilly, after another moment of hesitancy, "he's larnt me how to fix my hair. He says red hair is beautiful! He took me to a restyrant."

John looked troubled at this statement, and felt that his call at the studio would now be for a double purpose.

"'July 27,'" resumed Amarilly. "'The Boarder. 25 cents. Pade.'"

"Why, what possible use could he have for a surplice?"

"He's akeepin' company with a young gal--Lily Rose--and she wanted his likeness tooken sorter fancy-like, so he wuz took in the surplus, and he got himself framed in a gilt and shell frame, and she hez it ahangin' over her bed. I didn't want no pay from him, cause he give us his money when yours and Miss King's was gone, but he says as how it might bring him luck in gittin' her, so I took a quarter of a dollar.

"'July 29. Mister Vergil Washington. Reckter Colered Church. 1 doller. Pade.' Some one stole his'n off en the clo'es-line, and he only hed one.

"'July 31. Widder Hubbleston, 56 Wilkins St. 1 Doller. Pade.' She got merried by an Episcopal minister, and he furgot his surplus, and that was all she hed hired him fer, so she rented our'n fer him, and Mr. Jimmels, her new husband, took it outen the minister's pay. Somethin' allers goes wrong to her weddin's."

"Does she have them often?" interrupted John gravely.

"Quite frequent." "'Aug. 3, Mister Vedder, Ticket Seller to the Theayter. 1 doller. Pade.' He wore it to a sheet and piller case party. I didn't want fer to take nuthin' from him, cause he give us money when we hed the fever, but he wouldn't hev it that way.

"'Aug. 5. Pete Noyes. Gum.' He's the boy what sells gum to the theayter. He was agoin' to a party whar you hev to be the name of a book. He wore the surplus so his name was the Little Minister. We took it out in gum-- spruce and pepsin. Iry swallered his'n every time, and Miss Hudgers was afeard he'd be stuck together inside.

"'Aug. 9-23. Vawdevil Theayter. 5 dollers. Pade.' They put it on fer a sketch.

"'Aug. 25. Mister Cotter. 25 cents. Pade.' He's a brakeman friend of the Boarder. He wore it to a maskyrade.

"'Aug. 27. Poleece. 35 cents. Pade.'"

"Police!" ejaculated John faintly.

"Some one swiped it offen our clo'es-line, and when the police ketched the thief, we was subpenyed, or ma was. She got thirty-five cents, and all on us 'cept Iry went to hear her."

"'Aug, 29. Bishop Thurber. 5 dollers. Pade.'"

"Bishop Thurber!" the name was repeated with the force of an expletive.

"Seems to mind that more'n he did the police," thought Amarilly.

"It's quite a story," she explained, "and though it was orful at the beginnin' it come out all right, jest as the plays all do. I jest thought, I shouldn't hev put that down in the account, cause we give back the five, so we didn't make nuthin' in a way. We wuz dead broke. I suppose," she ruminated, "you don't know jest how orful it is to be that."

"I don't, Amarilly, from my own experience," replied John sympathetically, "but I can imagine how terrible it must be, and I am very sorry--"

"Well, as long as it come out all right, it don't make no difference. We'd got to pay our rent or else git put out, and I was up a stump till the Boarder said to tackle a pawnshop. I didn't hev nuthin' but the surplus to pawn, and I hated to pawn it on your account."

"I don't care, my child," was the fervent assurance, "where you took it as long as it helped you in your troubles."

"Well, I was in a pawnshop, and the man was holdin' it up, and the bishop went by, and when he seen what it was he come in, and asked me all about it, and I told him. He took it worse than you do that I would pawn it, and to save it he lent me five dollers. Course I made him take the surplus till I hed the money to git it outen hock, and when we was able to pay fer it, Bud went arter it. Thar was a boy practicin' at the church next door, and he warn't singin' it right, and Bud he couldn't keep still noway, so he up and sings the soler, and when the man at the orgin hearn him, he fired the boy what was tryin' to sing, and hired Bud in his place. He's agoin' to sing to a recital at Grace Church day arter to-morrer, and git ten dollers. And we air goin' to make Bud bank all he gits cause he ain't so strong as the rest of us. He may need it some time. That's all the places the surplus went to. I guess I'll go outen the costumin' business now, 'cause I'll be startin' in with Mr. Derry soon."