Part 17

Mr. Pitts playing with the snapshot of Ti-ta turned it toward her. It gave her the horrors just to look at the pictured face. Oh, dear! She did want to continue to be a queen, but she did not want to pay the price for the honor, if Mr. Pitts was right about the price. But was he? Would she have to marry that horror to remain a queen? She looked at Mr. Pitts suspiciously. Mr. Pitts was supposed to be her representative--her special representative--but he talked as if he were the counsel for the islands. He did not seem to be thinking of her at all.

"Then I am to understand," Mr. Pitts said a second time, and in a most ingratiating manner, "that you will resign your claim to the Sunshine Islands?"

His insistence made him more than ever like the detestable Mr. Pracht. Tessie tossed her head indignantly. What was there about her islands that everybody should try to take them from her? Resign! She would not resign anything until she knew, and even when she knew, she would resign nothing until she was ready. She was a queen, and she would keep her kingdom until she was thoroughly ready to give it up. She didn't care what this horrid Mr. Pitts said or what Joe Cary said. And she would keep Mr. Bill, too! The fighting blood of the Gilfoolys was in full command, but before she could muster her indignant thoughts into orderly sentences, which would explain her decision, Mr. Kingley had something to say. Mr. Kingley seemed as opposed to Mr. Pitts as Tessie was.

"Not so fast! Not so fast!" he cautioned. "Kingdoms aren't resigned as easily nor as quickly as that. It doesn't seem wise to me, a business man, for Queen Teresa to give up her rights until she knows what they are. I should advise her to visit the Sunshine Islands before she decides to give them to any one."

"Oh!" Tessie was aghast. "I never could put my foot on them! I wouldn't dare!" And although she was a Gilfooly and therefore brave as a lion, she was inconsistent enough to look piteously at Mr. Bill. Surely he would not want her to visit islands inhabited by cannibals.

"You see!" murmured Mr. Pitts, with a shrug of his broad shoulders.

"I should further suggest," went on Mr. Kingley, who seemed full of helpful suggestions, "that, as the queen is to marry my son, the visit to the islands might be a feature of their wedding trip."

"Gosh!" muttered Joe Cary, visualizing the headlines which such a wedding trip would produce in every newspaper.

"Oh!" exclaimed Tessie, but it was a very different "Oh" from the one she had uttered before. What a wonderful man old Mr. Kingley was! With Mr. Bill beside her, she would not be afraid if all six islands were covered with cannibals. She looked at Mr. Bill, her face all pink dimples.

"Now that," exclaimed Mr. Bill enthusiastically, "is a real idea!" He caught Tessie's hand and squeezed it.

But Mr. Pitts shook his head. "You would never be allowed to land," he prophesied.

"Well," exclaimed Tessie stubbornly, "I'm not going to give up my islands until I've seen them!" Mr. Kingley's suggestion was proving more alluring to her every minute.

Mr. Pitts sighed and settled himself for a long argument. He took great pains to hold the picture of Ti-ta so that Tessie would have to look at the tattooed face.

Tessie turned away from it. "And if I'm married to Mr. Bill," her voice shook with ecstasy at the thought, "I couldn't marry that man!"

"The islands would never recognize your marriage to any man but Ti-ta," Mr. Pitts insisted. "You would have to marry him or resign your claims. I am sorry that you don't like my suggestion. It was made to help you. I know what the islands are. I know how Pete Gilfooly managed to hold them. They are no place for a white woman!" And he told them more about the islands, and the barbarous customs of the natives, whom Pete Gilfooly had never been able to civilize, even if he had built them a church and a moving-picture theater. He made Tessie's warm blood run cold, and even Mr. Kingley shook his head.

"Why they're nothing but savages!" Mr. Kingley exclaimed in disgust.

"That's what I have been telling you," Mr. Pitts said patiently. "They have no respect or consideration for women. Miss Gilfooly, even if she is the queen, would be only Ti-ta's slave. She would be just one of his wives!"

"I wouldn't!" cried Tessie, fiercely indignant at such a statement. "I wouldn't marry anybody ever but Mr. Bill! And if those Sunshine Island people don't want me to be their queen, why I don't owe them anything!" She had suddenly made an amazing discovery. "I haven't any obligation to them at all!" Of course she hadn't! Mr. Kingley could talk about the responsibilities Providence had given her if he wanted to, but even Mr. Kingley should see that she owed nothing to a people who refused to let her take the responsibilities. "I'm glad I had the islands, that I was their queen," she went on eagerly, "for they brought me and Mr. Bill together, but now that we are together, I don't want them! Not for a minute! I think they're horrid! I wouldn't live where men can have half-a-dozen wives!"

"But--" began Mr. Kingley feebly.

He had never had anything to do with a royal abdication before, but he felt that this was not the way one should properly be managed. Surely there must be a system for such an affair.

Tessie stamped her foot. "Please, please don't make any more objections!" she begged. "If you were a girl, and had to choose between splendid Mr. Bill and that tattooed horror, you wouldn't hesitate a second, no matter how many kingdoms were thrown in with the native. I'd rather marry Mr. Bill than have a dozen kingdoms! I would!" she repeated defiantly. "I'm like Joe Cary," she even dared to say to purpling Mr. Kingley. "I've learned that women are of far more use to the world than queens."

"Good for you, Tess!" applauded Joe Cary.

"But--" Mr. Kingley began again ever more feebly.

"And anyway," went on Tessie, the words coming in an impetuous rush, "this is my kingdom, and if I want to give it back to the people I can! Can't I?" She appealed to Mr. Bill. "You would just as soon I wouldn't be a queen, wouldn't you?"

"I'd rather!" he told her honestly. "I'd a lot rather have you just little Tessie Gilfooly. I've told you more than once that I wished you weren't a queen."

Tessie drew a long breath and smiled radiantly at Mr. Bill. It pleased her enormously to hear that he liked her better as Tessie Gilfooly. But when she looked at Mr. Kingley she sighed. "I wish you did, too," she said wistfully. She could not be quite happy without Mr. Kingley's approval. "I wish you didn't want me to keep on being a queen."

Before Mr. Kingley could tell her how much better it was in his estimation for her to remain a queen, the door opened, and Mr. Phelps came in with a newspaper which he placed before Mr. Marvin.

"The noon edition of the _Gazette_," he explained importantly, and he looked curiously at Tessie. "I thought you should see this at once." And he pointed to an item in the upper left-hand corner of the folded sheet.

Mr. Marvin looked at the big headline. "Upon my word!" he exclaimed in astonishment. "A tidal wave has washed over the Sunshine Islands and destroyed two of them. Here is a dispatch from Honolulu that on the twenty-third of the month, a tidal wave swept over the Sunshine Islands and destroyed two of them!"

"Well, I'll be darned!" exclaimed Mr. Bill, the first to find his voice, and he put his arm around Tessie and held her tight, as if to make sure that she would not be swept away from him.

"A tidal wave!" cried Tessie, and she looked almost suspiciously at Mr. Pitts, as if she suspected that he had had something to do with the tidal wave. "Do they have those on the islands, too?" There seemed to be no end to the disagreeable things that could happen on the Sunshine Islands.

"Occasionally," mumbled Mr. Pitts, as he snatched the paper from Mr. Marvin and read the dispatch himself. "There used to be twelve islands in the group, but six of them have been destroyed by tidal waves. The last was in 1853 when the smallest, Ki-yu-hi, was swept away. I must cable Honolulu!" And he hurried from the room, Ka-kee-ta at his heels.

Tessie turned to Mr. Kingley. "Just suppose we had gone there on our wedding trip, Mr. Bill and I, and we had been swept away by a tidal wave!" she said, her face white at the mere thought. "How would you feel then? I shouldn't think you would want us to have anything to do with such a place."

"Well, well," muttered Mr. Kingley, somewhat dazed by the calamity in the Pacific Ocean. "I'm glad your uncle's money was banked in Honolulu. I guess this Pitts is right and those islands aren't any place for a white woman," he admitted slowly.

"Then, that's settled!" Tessie reached forward and patted his hand. "I'm glad you agree with us at last. But isn't it awful to have two whole islands destroyed like that? It wasn't my fault, was it? Nobody can blame me, can they? Even if I did have the Tear of God?" She snatched the royal jewel from her bag where she had tucked it when she came to the office, and threw it on the desk, as if it burned her fingers. "Do you suppose the islands were destroyed because Ka-kee-ta brought that to me? Do you suppose the people were right when they said misfortune would come to them if the Tear of God wasn't brought back?" Her face was quite white and her eyes full of awed fear. "I--I never want to see it again!" she gasped. "I think those islands are awful! If you aren't killed by savages, you're drowned by tidal waves!" She turned away from the royal pearl with horror.

"I'll take care of it for you," suggested Mr. Kingley, taking it in his hand. "I'll keep it in the store vault." He felt that something should be saved for Tessie from the wreck of her kingdom.

But Tessie shook her head. "I'll give it to Ka-kee-ta," she insisted, "and he can take it back to the islands, and maybe the rest of them will be saved; maybe then there won't be any more tidal waves."

"Sure, you can give it to Ka-kee-ta," Mr. Bill promised her. "I'll be glad to have him take it away from Waloo. I don't want him around, either. He'll be better off with Mr. Pitts. Mr. Pitts seems to understand natives. And some day I'll give you a string of real pearls."

"That's what I'd like!" Tessie was tearfully grateful. "Oh, what will Granny say?" she exclaimed suddenly. "I must go and tell her about the tidal wave and everything!"

XXVI

"Are you surprised?" Norah asked Joe as they went down in the elevator. She looked at Joe curiously, for there was a broad grin on Joe's face, and a grin was not what Norah expected him to wear under the circumstances. She would have said that a sad and sorry countenance was more befitting the occasion. But Joe looked anything but sad and sorry. Indeed, he was so jubilant that Norah borrowed some of his triumphant satisfaction and smiled, too.

He hesitated. "No," he said slowly, "I'm not surprised, although I don't know whether you refer to Tessie's engagement to Mr. Bill, or to Mr. Kingley's successful publicity campaign or to the loss of two of the Sunshine Islands?"

"I meant Tessie's engagement!" She was surprised that he did not understand which was the most important of the three events he mentioned. "I thought you were rather fond of our little queen, yourself," she said with the frank interest which was Norah Lee. There was an odd little breathlessness in her voice as she asked the question, and she watched his face with eager eyes.

Joe laughed carelessly. "Our little queen!" He ironically repeated the phrase which had been so often on the lips of Mr. Kingley. "Of course I'm fond of her. She has been like a sister to me. And she used to make me furious, when she was so unhappy, because she couldn't have everything that Ethel Kingley had, and yet she never would do anything to boost herself. She wouldn't do anything but grumble to poor old Granny. I used to talk to her like a Dutch uncle, and a fat lot of good it did until this jolt came. Now she has had a chance to see that it isn't enough to be rich and powerful--to have things. Tessie knows now that it takes more than power and riches to make a girl happy."

"That's right," agreed Norah quickly, and now she looked as jubilant as Joe had looked. "A girl does have to have more than things. She has to have love. I never used to believe that, but I know now it's true. Isn't it romantic?" she hurried on, as Joe started to ask her how she knew about love now. "Mr. Bill and the queen who was once a shopgirl! And all the time she was a shopgirl, Mr. Bill never saw her. Not until she was a queen!" It almost seemed as if she blamed Mr. Bill for such poor eyesight in regard to shopgirls.

"More credit to him!" declared Joe warmly. "I've always thought it was fine in Bill that he never saw the girls who work in the store. If he had run around after Tessie, I would have known he was a bad egg, but now-- You see, living at her house as I did, I felt as if she were a sister. I don't mind telling you that there was a time when I might have cared for her more than a fellow does care for a sister, but when this queen business came up I found I didn't. It showed me the girl I really did care for. Want to hear about her?" He asked in a most friendly fashion, and with a pleased chuckle which made her look at him quickly. There was a flush on his face and a light in his eyes she had never seen there before. They made her almost afraid to hear about this girl Joe really cared for, but she nodded bravely.

"Of course!" And there was just as much friendliness in her voice as there had been in Joe's--no more and no less. But the color slipped from her cheeks and left them rather white, and there was a puzzled expression in her eyes. "Of course, I've discovered I'm old-fashioned enough to adore romance."

"This romance isn't finished yet," Joe told her. His voice was not as confident as it had been. It was just a bit husky and anxious. "The heroine worked in the Evergreen, too. She was in the advertising department, and she used to agree with old Kingley that everything was publicity that came to the store."

"In the advertising department!" interrupted Norah, and all the pretty color rushed back to her cheeks, and her eyes danced. "Do I know her?" she demanded. "I used to work in the advertising department of the Evergreen, too, you know."

"Sure you know her. You see her every day. I used to think my girl was all for business and getting on, that she considered ambition and success as the only things that counted. But since I've seen her trying to help an ignorant little girl, and being kind and sympathetic to an old woman, why I know she's got a heart so big that it can hold more than ambition and success. Oh, what's the use of beating about the bush? You know I mean you! I hope you care for me, but if you don't to-day you will to-morrow. I'm a persevering cuss, and I usually get what I want."

"And what do you want?" asked Norah, and the corners of her mouth danced with her eyes. She tried hard to look only politely interested, but she just succeeded in looking eager to have him put his want in plain words.

"You," he said bluntly, "Tessie's a kid. She'll never grow up. She'll be some one for Bill to pet and play with all of his life. But I don't want a plaything. I want a woman for my mate, a woman who will help me do my share of the world's work and will let me help her do her share. I want more than a wife. I want a comrade! How about it?" Casual as the words were, Joe's voice was not casual. It held a deep note which thrilled Norah through and through and made her put her hand quickly into his.

"That's what counts," she whispered. "Understanding, comradeship. They mean as much as love, and when you have comradeship and love you are with the stars. We'll help each other," she promised with sweet solemnity.

"Here, what do you mean by holding up the traffic?" exclaimed Mr. Bill, who had remained behind with Tessie for a short consultation with Mr. Marvin, and who found them lingering flushed and important in the corridor. "Come on and help us tell Granny that her queen has abdicated."

"And Johnny, the Boy Scout," added Joe. "Johnny will take the news hard. He had great ideas about changing the cannibals into Scouts. He confided to me that just because there never had been a Scoutmaster as young as he is was no reason why there never would be one. It will take some tact to break the news to Johnny."

It took no tact at all to break it to Granny. She took off her glasses and looked at Tessie.

"My soul and body!" she murmured. "And you had to marry a man like Ka-kee-ta? I'm glad you said you wouldn't! And just imagine living where you could be drowned any minute! You did exactly right, Tessie! You'll be much safer and happier right here in Waloo, where we know what to expect." She was silent for a moment and then she added slowly, "the good Lord never forgets the Gilfoolys!"

"Oh come, Granny," objected Joe. "Don't tell me you think the Lord destroyed two perfectly good islands, and nobody knows how many people, to keep Tessie Gilfooly from making a fool of herself!"

"They were savages, Joe," corrected Granny. "Poor, ignorant savages, not much more than animals, to look at Ka-kee-ta and hear him talk. I'm sorry for him, but I can't help feeling more comfortable about Tessie. And, when you think of all the troubles those poor natives might have had--famine and smallpox and revolution--I guess a tidal wave was easy for them. I haven't liked much I heard about that kingdom of yours after I got over being proud to think you were a queen, Tessie, and if you had to marry a tattooed black man to keep it, I think you did exactly right to give it back. I expect we'll be a lot happier without any thrones in the family. There won't be any more kidnaping, and I shan't have to stay dressed up all the time. We can take it easy again, thank the good Lord! And you're going to marry Mr. Bill, Tessie? Can you believe it? You're a good lad, aren't you, Mr. Bill?" She looked questioningly into Mr. Bill's radiant face.

He stammered something, and Granny nodded her head.

"Well, well," she said. "To think of little Tessie Gilfooly marrying the big Evergreen! That means more to me than to hear you were queen of a lot of cannibals, away off in the Pacific Ocean. We've seen the Evergreen and know what it is! But Ka-kee-ta and his ax weren't a good advertisement for the islands. Well, well, I wonder what Mrs. Scanlon'll say now! She's been snooping around all morning, wanting to know if we were back for good and saying she was glad her Lil was satisfied to be a good stenographer and didn't aim to be what she couldn't be. I wonder what she'll say when she hears you're going to marry the Evergreen! Well, well! I guess we'd all better have a cup of coffee and steady our nerves after what we been through. And, Tessie, you'd better change your dress. I like you to look like a queen so long's you got the clothes. This has been good for Tessie," she confided to the others as Tessie tore her hand from Mr. Bill, and obediently ran up the narrow stairs.

"It's good for any girl to think she is a queen for a while. And she don't have to be told she's queen of any cannibal islands, either. It's enough for a girl to know she's queen of a good man's heart."

"You are!" Granny caught Norah in a warm embrace. Granny did not seem at all surprised to hear what Norah was, but she did seem pleased.

"You see, the Lord has been good to the Carys as well as to the Gilfoolys," grinned Joe, and he put his arm around the two women.

"Well, well!" Granny put Norah away so that she could look into her shining face. "All I can say is you're a lucky girl. Joe Cary's been a good friend, and he'll make a good husband. I know!" And she looked at Norah and then at Joe, as if indeed she did know.

"Not as good as Mr. Bill!" declared Tessie from the doorway. She was breathless with the haste she had made, but she looked more familiar to them now in her crepe frock than she had in the shabby black sateen. "Mr. Bill is going to make the best husband in the world!" she told Granny confidently, as she slipped her fingers into Mr. Bill's waiting hand.

"You darling!" exclaimed Mr. Bill chokingly, and he put out his arm and drew her closer. "You darling Tessie Gilfooly!" And he kissed her warm red lips.

Granny smiled at them and at Joe and Norah. "What a grand thing that would be," she said slowly, "if all the men would try to be the best husbands in the world, and all the girls would try to be the best wives in the world. I guess then we wouldn't have no divorces. H--sh! Is that Johnny in the pantry?" Her keen ears had caught the rattle of crockery. "Who's going to tell him that some of the Sunshine Islands have been washed away by a tidal wave? Who's going to tell him that Tessie's given back her kingdom and now the islands'll never have Boy Scouts?"

* * * * *

_Novels for Cheerful Entertainment_

* * * * *

GALUSHA THE MAGNIFICENT

_By Joseph C. Lincoln_

_Author of "Showings," "The Portygee," etc._

The whole family will laugh over this deliciously humorous novel, that pictures the sunny side of small-town life, and contains love-making, a dash of mystery, an epidemic of spook-chasing--and laughable, lovable Galusha.

THESE YOUNG REBELS

_By Frances R. Sterrett_

_Author of "Nancy Goes to Town," "Up the Road with Sally," etc._

A sprightly novel that hits off to perfection the present antagonism between the rebellious younger generation and their disapproving elders.

PLAY THE GAME

_By Ruth Comfort Mitchell_

A happy story about American young people. The appealing qualities of a brave young girl stand out in the strife between two young fellows, the one by fair the other by foul means, to win her.

IN BLESSED CYRUS

_By Laura E. Richards_

_Author of "A Daughter of Jehu," etc._

The quaint, quiet village of Cyrus, with its whimsical villagers, is abruptly turned topsy-turvy by the arrival in its midst of an actress, distractingly feminine, Lila Laughter; and, at the same time, an epidemic of smallpox.

HELEN OF THE OLD HOUSE

_By Harold Bell Wright_

Wright's greatest novel, that presents the life of industry to-day, the laughter, the tears, the strivings of those who live about the smoky chimneys of an American industrial town.

* * * * *

AMONG THE NEWEST NOVELS

* * * * *

THE HOUSE OF MOHUN

By GEORGE GIBBS, Author of "Youth Triumphant," etc.

A distinguished novel depicting present day society and its most striking feature, the "flapper." A story of splendid dramatic qualities.

THE COVERED WAGON

By EMERSON HOUGH, Author of "The Magnificent Adventure," "The Story of the Cowboy," etc.

A novel of the first water, clear and clean, is this thrilling story of the pioneers, the men and women who laid the foundation of the great west.

HOMESTEAD RANCH

By ELIZABETH G. YOUNG

The _New York Times_ says that "Homestead Ranch" is one of the season's "two best real wild and woolly western yarns." The _Boston Herald_ says, "So delightful that we recommend it as one of the best western stories of the year."

SACRIFICE

By STEPHEN FRENCH WHITMAN, Author of "Predestined," etc.

How a woman, spoiled child of New York society, faced the dangers of the African jungle trail. "One feels ever the white heat of emotional conflict."--_Philadelphia Public Ledger._

DOUBLE-CROSSED

By W. DOUGLAS NEWTON, Author of "Low Ceilings," etc.

"An excellently written and handled tale of adventure and thrills in the dark spruce valleys of Canada."--_New York Times._

JANE JOURNEYS ON

By RUTH COMFORT MITCHELL, Author of "Play the Game," etc.

The cheerful story of a delightful heroine's adventures from Vermont to Mexico.

* * * * *

A CHOICE SHELF OF NOVELS

* * * * *

ABBÉ PIERRE