The Carter Girls' Mysterious Neighbors. Speed Nell
and no height; Miss Ella, all height and no breadth. Miss Louise was dark of complexion, with coal-black hair streaked with grey; Miss Ella was a strawberry blonde with sandy hair streaked with grey. Age that brought the grey hair seemed about the only thing they had in common, except, of course, the estate of Grantly. That had been willed to them by their father with a grim humor, as he must have been well aware of their idiosyncrasies. They were to hold the property together with no division, the one who survived to inherit the whole.
“Well!” said Miss Ella over the shoulder of her sister, who refused to give her right of way but who was silenced for the moment by shortness of breath. “Why did you come today when you wrote you were coming to-morrow?”
“I did not write I was coming tomorrow,” said Douglas, smiling in spite of herself.
“There! What did I tell you?” panted Miss Louise. “You said Tuesday, didn’t you, honey?” with ingratiating sweetness.
“No, Miss Grant, I said Wednesday.”
The incident was closed. The wrangling sisters had no more to say on the subject except to apologize for not having them met. It was explained that Billy Sutton had gone to get Mr. and Mrs. Carter, but the trunks must be sent for. Quite humbly Miss Ella went to get her farmhand to hitch up the mules to drive to the station, while Miss Louise showed the girls over the house.
Everything was in beautiful order and shining with cleanliness. The white pine floors were scrubbed until they reminded the girls of biscuit boards, and very lovely did the bright rag rugs look on these floors. The furniture was very plain with the exception of an occasional bit of fine old mahogany. A beautiful old highboy was not too proud to stay in the same room with a cheap oak dresser, and in the basement dining-room a handsome mahogany table democratically mingled with split-bottom chairs.
Miss Louise had put flowers everywhere for their reception the day before and the whole house was redolent of late roses and mignonette and citronella. An occasional whiff of carbolic acid and chloride of lime gave evidence of the indomitable practicality of Miss Ella.
Miss Louise proved very sweet and kindly when not in her sister’s presence and later on the girls found Miss Ella to be really very agreeable. Both ladies seemed to be bent on showing kindness and consideration to their tenants to make up for the mistake about their day of arrival.
Mr. and Mrs. Carter could not help thinking that the place their daughters had chosen for them to spend the winter was pretty. As they rolled up in Billy’s car the quaint house and beautiful lawn certainly presented a most pleasing aspect, and their handsome daughters were an added loveliness to the landscape as they hurried to meet their parents.
“Ah, this is great!” exclaimed Mr. Carter, taking a deep breath of the pure fresh air. “I think I shall have to have a cow and some pigs and do some fall plowing besides. Eh, Helen? You and I are to be the stay-at-homes. What do you think?”
“I think what you think, Daddy,” answered Helen, smiling happily over her father’s show of enthusiasm. Dr. Wright had told her that with returning healthy nerves would come the enthusiasm that before his illness had seemed to be part of Robert Carter’s make-up.
“How do you like it, Mumsy?” asked Douglas as she drew her arm through her mother’s.
“Very nice, I am sure, but I think it would be wiser for me to go to bed now. I am not very strong and if I can give up before I drop it would be less trouble for my family,” and Mrs. Carter took on a most plaintive accent. “A little tea and toast will be all I want for my supper.”
“Oh now, it will be too bad for you to go to bed,” said Miss Ella. “We were planning to have all of you come up to Grantly for supper.”
She and Miss Louise seemed to have agreed for once on the propriety of having their tenants to supper.
“The count is coming,” said Miss Louise, with a sentimental note in her full voice.
“The count! Who is the count?” asked Mrs. Carter with some show of animation and interest.
“He is a nobleman who has settled in our neighborhood,” said Miss Ella in a matter-of-fact tone, as though noblemen were the rule rather than the exception in her life.
“Maybe it would be possible for me to take a short rest and come to Grantly,” said Mrs. Carter, with a quickening in her pretty eyes.
At mention of the count, Billy Sutton pretended to be much occupied with his engine, but Nan noticed a slight curl on his lip as he bent over the wheel.
CHAPTER III
THE COUNT
“Isn’t it fine not to have to bother about supper?” said Helen, as she and Douglas were attempting to get some order out of the chaos of trunks that had been brought from the station and systematically put in the wrong place by the good-natured, shambling, inefficient darky who served as factotum to the Misses Grant.
Helen and Douglas had decided to take one attic room in the old house for their bedroom; Bobby was to have the other; the large chamber below them was to serve as family sitting-room; Nan and Lucy were to have the upstairs room in the new house; Mr. and Mrs. Carter the lower room; the shed room was to serve as guest chamber when needed; the dining-room was in the basement. Over the outside kitchen was another extremely low attic room that was to be the servant’s bedroom, when they got her. This room was accessible from the kitchen by a flight of primitive chicken steps, that is, accessible to the young and agile.
The two servants the Carters had had at the week-end camp had been eager to come with them to the country, but Douglas and Helen had decided that they were expensive luxuries, and as much as they hated to part with them, had determined to have a country girl, accustomed to less wages than Susan, and to do without a manservant in place of the faithful, if high-priced, Oscar. Dr. Wright had insisted that some chores were indispensable for Mr. Carter, such as chopping wood, carrying water, etc., and that gentleman was eager to assist wherever he could.
“Surely you are not going to dress up to go out to supper this evening,” said Douglas, as Helen shook out a pretty little old-rose dinner gown, a leftover from the time when the Carters purchased clothes for every occasion and for every passing style and season.
“I am going to dress suitably, but I don’t call it dressing up,” said Helen, hunting for the stockings to match the gown. “I think Father is well enough for me to wear silk stockings this evening,” she said a little wistfully. We all remember that in the first throes of agony over her father’s nervous breakdown Helen had taken an oath not to wear silk stockings until he was well. “What do you think, Douglas?”
“Of course, you goose, just so you don’t have to buy the stockings,” laughed Douglas. “I am going to wear what I have on, I can tell you that. There is a lot to do to get the beds made up and the house ready to sleep in, and I have no idea of unpacking my own trunk until tomorrow,” and Douglas unlocked the trunk that held the bed linen.
“Oh, Douglas, please put on your grey crêpe de chine! I’ll get it out for you and find your stockings and everything,” begged Helen. “I don’t think it is very respectful to our hostesses for you not to be suitably dressed.”
“Is it altogether our hostesses you are thinking about?” teased Douglas.
“Whom else should I consider?”
“How about the count?”
“Well, naturally I can’t help thinking some about a nobleman,” declared Helen frankly. “Do you fancy he is young or old, rich or poor, handsome or ugly? I am wild to see him.”
“I can’t imagine. They didn’t even say what he was a count of. I hope he is not German. I must say I’d hate to put on my best dress for a German count,” laughed Douglas.
“Why, Douglas, I wouldn’t be so biased as all that. As long as our country is neutral, I don’t think it is fair for us to take such a stand. I’d rather dress up for a German count than – than – a Russian anarchist or maybe an Australian Bushman.”
“Well, I am not pining to dress up for anybody, but if I must,