Chapter 16

There was one little ominous cloud in the serene sky of Mrs. Jenkins's happiness. She had nothing suitable for the occasion of the organ recital in the way of wearing apparel.

"I feel as if gloves was due you, Bud," she lamented, "but I kin't afford 'em. I guess I kin put my hands under my mantilly, though, and folks won't know."

"She'd orter hev 'em, and she'd orter hev a new hat, too," reflected Bud, and his song became a requiem. He manfully resolved to sacrifice his future to present needs and curtail the laundry fund. After some meditation he called upon the bishop, and asked if he might have an advance of half the amount he would receive for his solo.

The bishop readily assented, but sought the reason for the request.

"My mother is comin' to the recital, but she ain't got no fixin's. I'm goin' to buy her a hat."

"I am glad you think of your mother, my lad, but it would be well to let some older person select it for you. My housekeeper--"

Bud's refusal was emphatic. He knew the kind of hat his mother wanted, and he had noted her quickly suppressed look of disappointment at the sombre hat donated by Mrs. Hudgers on the day of the police-court attendance.

Upon receiving the five dollars he went directly to the Fashion Emporium, where the windows were filled with a heterogeneous assortment of gayly trimmed hats, marked enticingly with former and present prices.

"I want a hat kivered with flowers," he announced.

"Who for?" asked the young saleswoman.

"For my mother."

"How would you like a nice flower toque like this?" displaying a headgear of modest forget-me-nots.

"That's all faded. Ain't you got any red flowers? If you haven't, I know a store where they keep 'em."

The girl instantly sacrificed her ideas of what was fitting to the certainty of a sale, and quickly produced a hat of green foliage from which rose long-stemmed, nodding red poppies, "a creation marked down to three-ninety-eight," she informed him.

"That's the kind! I'll take it and a pair of white gloves, too, if you've got some big ones fer a dollar."

Bud hastened home with his purchases. His mother was quite overcome by the sight of such finery.

"I never thought to be dressed up again," she exclaimed on the eventful night, "No one has bought me nuthin' to wear sence your pa died. I feel like I was some one outen a book."

The entire family, save Iry, who was put to bed at a neighbor's, went to the recital. The Boarder took Lily Rose, who was quite flustered at her first appearance with the family.

John and Colette occupied a pew directly opposite the family. Mr. Vedder and Pete were also in attendance.

When the bishop came from the vestry and walked down the aisle to his pew, his eyes fell upon the worn, seamed face of Bud's mother, the weary patient eyes in such odd contrast to the youthful turban with its smartly dancing flowers. Something stirred in his well-regulated heart, and he carefully wiped his glasses.

At the signal from the choirmaster for the solo of the oratorio, Bud arose. An atom of a boy he looked in the vast, vaulted chancel, and for the first time he knew fear at the thought of singing. It was a terrible thing, after all, to face this sea of staring, dancing people. As lightning reaches to steel, the gay poppies nodding so nervously above his mother's white, anxious face sought the courage place within, and urged him on. He felt himself back in Clothes-line Park, alone with his mother and the blue sky.

The little figure filled itself with a long, deep breath. The high, clear note merged into one with the notes of the chorus. It touched the tones of the accompaniment in harmony true, and swelled into grand, triumphant music.

"He looks like he did arter the fever," thought Amarilly anxiously.

When he came down the aisle with the choir, the ethereal look had left his face, and he was again a happy little boy. He gave his mother a gay nod, and bestowed a wink upon the Boarder. He waited outside and the family wended their way homeward.

There had not been time to bring in the clothes before leaving, but a willing neighborhood had guarded the premises for them, so Clothes-line Park was shrouded in a whiteness that looked ghostly in the moonlight.

They made quite an affair of the evening in honor of Bud's song, and their introduction to Lily Rose. There were fried sausages, coffee, sandwiches, and pork cake.

"The organist told me," announced Bud at supper, "that he was agoin' to train my voice, and I could be soloist at Grace Church and git five dollars a Sunday, and after a while I could git ten."

"You'll be a millynaire," prophesied Bobby in awed tones.

"Guess we'll be on Easy Street now," shouted Cory.

"We won't be nuthin' of the kind," snapped Amarilly. "It's agoin' to all be banked fer Bud."

"I guess," said Bud, in his quiet, little old-man way, "I'm the one to hev the say. I'm agoin' to give ma two dollars a week and bank the rest."

Meanwhile John was having an uncomfortable time as he walked home with Colette. He had started on the trail of the surplice the day before. The "tenner" and the young ladies who had given the tableaux had been interviewed, but in neither case had the mysterious pocket been discovered. To-day he had visited the Beehive, but no one in the store had paid any attention to the pocket, or knew of its existence. Colette remained obdurate to his pleadings. She assumed that he was entirely to blame for the loss, and seemed to take a gleeful delight in showing him how perverse and wilful she could be. To-night he found himself less able than usual to cope with her caprices, so he began to talk of impersonal matters and dwelt upon the beauties of Bud's voice, and the astonishing way in which it had developed.

She admitted that Bud's voice was indeed wonderful, but maintained that Mrs. Jenkins's poppy hat and white gloves had been far surpassing in the way of surprises.

"Did you ever, John, see anything more shoutingly funny?"

"It wasn't funny, Colette," he said wistfully, and he proceeded to relate the history of the hat as he had heard it from the bishop that day.

And though in the depths of her heart Colette was touched by the pathos of the purchase, she must needs tread again the feminine labyrinth instead of following the more natural and open path.

"Who was the young girl with the Boarder?" John next vouchsafed.

"Why, Lily Rose, of course. The Lily for whom he 'sot for his likeness in the surplus.' That awful surplice," she burst forth in irritation at the mere mention of the unfortunate word. "Some of these people must have it. John, you don't half try to find it."

"I am following out the list in order," he assured her. "I shall go to see Mrs. Hudgers to-morrow."

"And the next one to her," reminded Colette, "is Derry Phillips, Amarilly's new benefactor. She told me to-day that she had a note from him, asking her to begin work at the studio in a few days."

"I have a double duty in my call there," said John didactically. "If he is like some of the young artists I know, his studio will hardly be a proper place for Amarilly."

"As it happens," returned Colette coldly, "Derry Phillips, for all his nonsense, is reported to be a true gentleman; but it would make no difference with Amarilly if he were not. Her inherent goodness would counteract the evil of any atmosphere. She can take care of his rooms until she is a little older. Then she can become a model."

"Colette!" he exclaimed protestingly.

"Why not?" she returned. "Why shouldn't Amarilly be a model, or go on the stage? Neither place would be below her station in life."

John sought refuge in utter silence which admonished and exasperated Colette far more than any reproof would have done.

"You might as well go, if you have nothing to say," she remarked stiffly, as he lingered in the portico, evidently expecting an invitation to enter.

"I have _too_ much to say, Colette."

Her sidelong glance noted his dejection, and her flagging spirits rose again.

"Too much, indeed, when you are so critical of what I say!"

"Colette, hear me!"

"No, I won't listen--never when you preach!"

"I don't mean to preach, Colette, but don't you think--"

"Good night, John," she said, smiling.

"Good night!" he echoed dolefully, but making no move to leave. "Colette, will you never tell me?"

"Yes," she replied unexpectedly, with a dancing light in her beautiful eyes.

"When?"

"When you restore to me what was in the pocket."