Myrtle Reed - At the Sign of the Jack O'Lantern

“I don’t know w’y not, Miss. Anyhow, ’e killed the cat, that’s wot ’e did, and I saw ’is dead body, and even buried ’im, on account of your uncle not bein’ able to abide cats, and ’ere ’e is. Somebody ’s dug ’im up, and ’e ’s come to life again, thinkin’ to ’aunt your uncle, and your uncle ’as follered ’im, that’s wot ’e ’as, and there bein’ nobody ’ere to ’aunt but us, ’e’s a ’auntin’ us and a-doin’ it ’ard.”

“Mrs. Smithers,” said Dorothy, rising, “I desire to hear no more of this nonsense. The cat happens to be somewhat similar to the dead one, that’s all.”

“Begging your parding, Miss, for askin’, but did you bring that there cat with you from the city?”

Affecting not to hear, Dorothy went out, followed by Claudius Tiberius, who appeared anything but ghostly.

“I knowed it,” muttered Mrs. Smithers, gloomily, to herself. “’E was ’ere w’en ’er come, and ’e’s the same cat. ’E’s come back to ’aunt us, that’s wot ’e ’as!”

“Harlan,” said Dorothy, half-way between smiles and tears, “she’s come.”

Harlan dropped his saw and took up his hammer. “Who’s come?” he asked. “From your tone, it might be Mrs. Satan, or somebody else from the infernal regions.”

“You’re not far out of the way,” rejoined Dorothy. “It’s Sa – Mrs. Smithers.”

“Oh, our maid of all work?”

“I don’t know what she’s made of,” giggled Dorothy, hysterically. “She looks like a tombstone dressed in deep mourning, and carries with her the atmosphere of a graveyard. We have to call her ‘Mrs. Smithers,’ if we don’t want her to call us by our first names, and she has two dollars a week. She says Claudius is a cat that uncle killed the week before he died, and she thinks you hit me and gave me this bruise on my cheek.”

“The old lizard,” said Harlan, indignantly. “She sha’n’t stay!”

“Now don’t be cross,” interrupted Dorothy. “It’s all in the family, for your uncle hit me, as you well know. Besides, we can’t expect all the virtues for two dollars a week and I’m tired almost to death from trying to do the housework in this big house and take care of the chickens, too. We’ll get on with her as best we can until we see a chance to do better.”

“Wise little woman,” responded Harlan, admiringly. “Can she milk the cow?”

“I don’t know – I’ll go in and ask her.”

“Excuse me, Miss,” began Mrs. Smithers, before Dorothy had a chance to speak, “but am I to ’ave my old rooms?”

“Which rooms were they?”

“These ’ere, back of the kitchen. My own settin’ room and bedroom and kitchen and pantry and my own private door outside. Your uncle was allers a great hand for bein’ private and insistin’ on other folks keepin’ private, that ’s wot ’e was, but God rest ’is soul, it didn’t do the poor old gent much good.”

“Certainly,” said Dorothy, “take your old rooms. And can you milk a cow?”

Mrs. Smithers sighed. “I ain’t never ’ad it put on me, Miss,” she said, with the air of a martyr trying to make himself comfortable up against the stake, “not as a regler thing, I ain’t, but wotever I’m asked to do in the line of duty whiles I’m dwellin’ in this sufferin’ and dyin’ world, I aims to do the best wot I can, w’ether it’s milkin’ a cow, drownin’ kittens, or buryin’ a cat wot can’t stay buried.”

“We have breakfast about half-past seven,” went on Dorothy, quickly; “luncheon at noon and dinner at six.”

“Wot at six?” demanded Mrs. Smithers, pricking up her ears.

“Dinner! Dinner at six.”

“Lord preserve us,” said Mrs. Smithers, half to herself. “Your uncle allers ’ad ’is dinner at one o’clock, sharp, and ’e wouldn’t like it to ’ave such scandalous goin’s on in ’is own ’ouse.”

“You’re working for me,” Dorothy reminded her sharply, “and not for my uncle.”

There was a long silence, during which Mrs. Smithers peered curiously at her young mistress over her steel-bowed spectacles. “I’m not so sure as you,” she said. “On account of the cat ’avin come back from ’is grave, it wouldn’t surprise me none to see your uncle settin’ ’ere at any time in ’is shroud, and a-askin’ to ’ave mush and milk for ’is supper, the which ’e was so powerful fond of that I was more ’n ’alf minded at the last minute to put some of it in ’s coffin.”

“Mrs. Smithers,” said Dorothy, severely, “I do not want to hear any more about dead people, or resurrected cats, or anything of that nature. What’s gone is gone, and there’s no use in continually referring to it.”

At this significant moment, Claudius Tiberius paraded somewhat ostentatiously through the kitchen and went outdoors.

“You see, Miss?” asked Mrs. Smithers, with ill-concealed satisfaction. “Wot’s gone ain’t always gone for long, that’s wot it ain’t.”

Dorothy retreated, followed by a sepulchral laugh which grated on her nerves. “Upon my word, dear,” she said to Harlan, “I don’t know how we’re going to stand having that woman in the house. She makes me feel as if I were an undertaker, a grave digger, and a cemetery, all rolled into one.”

“You’re too imaginative,” said Harlan, tenderly, stroking her soft cheek. He had not yet seen Mrs. Smithers.

“Perhaps,” Dorothy admitted, “when she gets that pyramid of crape off her head, she’ll seem more nearly human. Do you suppose she expects to wear it in the house all the time?”

“Miss Carr!”

The gaunt black shadow appeared in the doorway of the kitchen and the high, harsh voice shrilled imperiously across the yard.

“I’m coming,” answered Dorothy, submissively, for in the tone there was that which instinctively impels obedience. “What is it?” she asked, when she entered the kitchen.

“Nothink. I only wants to know wot it is you’re layin’ out to ’ave for your – luncheon, if that’s wot you call it.”

“Poached eggs on toast, last night’s cold potatoes warmed over, hot biscuits, jam, and tea.”

Mrs. Smithers’s articulate response resembled a cluck more closely than anything else.

“You can make biscuits, can’t you?” went on Dorothy, hastily.

“I ’ave,” responded Mrs. Smithers, dryly. “Begging your parding, Miss, but is that there feller sawin’ wood out by the chicken coop your ’usband?”

“The gentleman in the yard,” said Dorothy, icily, “is Mr. Carr.”

“Be n’t you married to ’im?” cried Mrs. Smithers, dropping a fork. “I understood as ’ow you was, else I wouldn’t ’ave come. I was never one to – ”

“I most assuredly am married to him,” answered Dorothy, with due emphasis on the verb.

“Oh! ’E’s the build of my youngest sister’s poor dead ’usband; the one wot broke the tea set wot I give ’er over ’er poor ’ed. ’E can ’it powerful ’ard, can’t ’e?”

Quite beyond speech, Dorothy went outdoors again, her head held high and a dangerous light in her eyes. To-morrow, or next week at the latest, should witness the forced departure of Mrs. Smithers. Mrs. Carr realised that the woman did not intend to be impertinent, and that the social forms of Judson Centre were not those of New York. Still, some things were unbearable.

The luncheon that was set before them, however, went far toward atonement. With the best intentions in the world, Dorothy’s cooking nearly always went wide of the mark, and Harlan welcomed the change with unmistakable pleasure.

“I say, Dorothy,” he whispered, as they rose from the table; “get on with her if you can. Anybody who can make such biscuits as these will go out of the house only over my dead body.”