"What ever is the matter o' you, Marty Day? I never see your beat."

"Sh!" the boy said, his face suddenly displaying all the fear and anxiety he had been hiding.

His father took his bedtime pipe from his lips and stared. "What ever is it's got you?" he asked.

The boy leaned over the table. Like conspirators, with their heads close together, the three talked in whispers. After Aunt Almira's first involuntary cry of horror, which she smothered at once, their voices never reached a key that could have made them audible ten feet away.

Meanwhile the schoolmaster and Walky Dexter were in close consultation.

Nelson had made no mistake when he took the expressman into the plot.

Walky was by nature a chatterer and a gossip, but he would have cut off his right hand rather than hurt Janice Day. While Janice made ready for bed plans were forming to hide from her as long as possible--until the newspaper story could be verified at least--that which had come over the telegraph wires from Mexico.

The girl was less troubled by fears for her father's safety than she had been for a long time. It was of Uncle Jason's trouble she thought. And she was quite sure her father would be able to help his brother considerably in straightening out the difficulty that confronted Jason Day.

It had been figured out just what it would cost to renew the notes and pay interest on them, if the bank would allow Mr. Day to do that. Over seven hundred dollars per year! An enormous sum for Uncle Jason to contemplate--while the princ.i.p.al would hang over him like a threatening cloud. The interest money alone was more than he could easily earn over and above the family's living expenses.

He had got into the toils of the cunning Hotchkiss through lending the storekeeper a small sum at eight per cent, in the beginning and being paid promptly. The bank carried the notes for six per cent, of course.

The morrow was Sunday. Janice went her usual calm way. People seemed rather nicer to her than usual, but their att.i.tude did not arouse her suspicions in the least. At church there seemed to be more groups than usual both before and after service who whispered together. Mr. Middler, the pastor, who loved Janice as he might his own daughter, added a warmer pressure to his handclasp. Mrs. Middler kissed her several times, and Janice thought with some surprise that the affectionate woman had been crying. Elder Concannon, that stern and bewhiskered patriarch who had once looked upon Janice Day and her ideas as the very leaven of unrighteousness in the community, strode over to the girl and rested his hands upon her shoulders to make her look up at him.

"Ha!" he said. "Just as brave as ever, are you? You're not fearing the future, my girl?"

"How can I when the past has been so lovely?" she asked him soberly.

"Ha!" and he wagged his head. "So _that's_ the way the past has seemed to you, eh?"

He said no more; but Janice wondered what the matter was with Elder Concannon. He was so seldom demonstrative.

CHAPTER VI

THE SHADOW OF COMING EVENTS

Nelson Haley was not at church that Sunday. He was seen to ride away with Walky Dexter early in the morning and they took the lower Middletown road. When they returned late in the afternoon they a.s.sured each other that they had accomplished much.

They had prepared the way for Janice when she should go to the seminary on Monday--and more. It seemed to Janice that week as though the girls had never before been so nice to her. One of the instructors kept her in the office it was true when she arrived on Monday, over a really trivial matter, while the princ.i.p.al was addressing the student body; but the subject of the princ.i.p.al's address did not interest Janice, she learned later, she being only a day pupil. In fact she was merely taking a postgraduate course in certain studies.

Nor did she imagine that the editor of the Middletown _Courier_ went to his office that Monday morning and "killed" a two-column news feature he had planned for the front page, as well as an editorial and a certain "intimate note" of neighborhood gossip under the heading of "Polktown Activities."

Nelson Haley was not omnipotent. He could not reach everybody or foretell all combinations of events that might reveal to Janice her father's peril. But he had done his best. _The Weekly Courier_ would not mention Mexican matters in its Thursday's issue. Meanwhile Nelson, with Uncle Jason and Mr. Middler, the pastor of the Polktown Union Church, as a self-appointed committee, endeavored to get the truth from the Border regarding the uprising in the Companos District and particularly the facts of the situation at the Alderdice Mine.

Janice Day's cheerfulness was almost uncanny. She had determined to be cheerful and optimistic about the Day homestead because she knew that her uncle and aunt were so cast down. She was not at all surprised therefore by their frequently solemn countenances and their whispering in corners together.

When she found Aunt 'Mira in tears she comforted her, believing that it was because of her husband's troubles that the woman wept. That Marty should wear a cloud of gloom most of the time merely proved how deeply the boy had been stirred by his father's trouble.

If Uncle Jason was distrait was it any wonder? His lawyer could give him little comfort, Janice understood, regarding the settlement of the absconding storekeeper's notes. A search for a.s.sets was being made; but it looked as though Tom Hotchkiss had intended to be dishonest from the start and had laid all his plans accordingly and with judgment worthy of a better cause.

Already attempts were being made to find the absent storekeeper. It was suspected that he had gone to Canada. If he remained there it might be possible to lay hands upon him, for his act const.i.tuted a felony and he could be extradited.

"Wherever he's gone," said Uncle Jason gloomily, "he's gone fast and he's gone fur. No doubt o' that. And 'nless he lost the money in speculation or the like, he's probably hid it where _we_ can't find it.

It looks like we wouldn't be able to lay our han's on him before the first note goes to protest."

Being so sure of her father's good judgment, his willingness and his ability to help Uncle Jason, Janice Day's heart was still free from any deeper care as the days went by. As she had told Elder Concannon, the past had been so lovely to her, why should she fear the future?

Marty had been urged to remain at school for the present; but the boy was in earnest when he said he was willing and ready to do his share toward the support of the family. Indeed, he obtained a place in Partlett's store to work on the books and write out statements every day after school and until late on Sat.u.r.day evenings. This saved his self-respect, as he felt, and was not a bad thing for him at all. He was to give his mother the four dollars a week Mr. Partlett promised him.

A letter from Broxton Day (the last Janice was destined to receive from her father for a long time, did she but know it) arrived early in the week following the inception of the conspiracy for Janice's peace of mind. It was a cheerful, jolly letter and the girl had it tucked in the bosom of her blouse when she halted her car on the way back from Middletown on Wednesday afternoon before Hopewell Drugg's store.

When Janice opened the store door the place was empty; but from the rear came the quavering notes of a violin. Being drawn from the wailing strings was a new harmony--new, that is, for Hopewell Drugg. He was fond of the old tunes; but for the most part his musical tastes ran to cheerful ballads or love songs.

Janice, tiptoeing quietly across the shop floor, listened with a rather wistful little smile upon her lips. Like a big bee Hopewell Drugg was humming the words of the song so popular forty years ago when sung by a certain silver-voiced singer:

"'Rock-a-bye, baby, on the tree top, When the wind blows the cradle will rock.

If the bough breaks the cradle will fall; Down will come cradle, baby and all!

Then, it's rock-a-bye, rock-a-bye, mother is near; And it's rock-a-bye, rock-a-bye, nothing to fear.

If the bough breaks the cradle will fall; Down will come cradle, baby and all!'"

"Oh, Mr. Drugg!" murmured Janice, coming into the back room where the bespectacled storekeeper was playing. "That is so pretty! And the time and rhythm are just perfect, aren't they?"

"How-do, Miss Janice?" he said, reddening almost boyishly. "Thank you."

"Is Miss 'Rill inside?" Janice asked, for it was difficult to remember to call the storekeeper's wife by any name but that to which she had responded for so many years while she taught the Polktown ungraded school.

"You'll find her there," said Hopewell with a gesture of his bow. "Go right in--do."

Janice ran across the open porch and into the sitting room. The light-haired and pink-cheeked little woman, who sat sewing by the table, looked up with lips parted for a startled cry. The tiny garment with which she had been busily and so happily engaged was covered flutteringly by her ap.r.o.n while a faint flush dyed her cheeks.

"Oh! is it you, Janice dear?" she said and in a relieved tone.

"'Tis I, honey," cried the girl, running around back of her. She stooped and kissed the flushed cheek--oh! so tenderly--dropping into 'Rill's lap a little parcel.

"What is it? For _me_?" queried the storekeeper's wife, twitching briskly at the knotted string of Janice's parcel. "You are always bringing me some gift, dear girl."

"But--but this isn't exactly for you," Janice said with some hesitation.

"No?" She unwrapped the tissue covering. Then: "Oh, Janice! how sweet!"

She held up the little fleecy cap of Janice's own knitting before her eyes in which the tears trembled. "And bootees, too! You darling!"

Janice sat down and they talked happily.

Since 'Rill Scattergood and Hopewell Drugg had married, their life together--save for a few weeks--had been very happy. And now a greater and holier happiness was on the way to them. Sharing the secret was one of the sweetest experiences that had ever come into Janice Day's life.

"I must put these away," 'Rill said, smiling. "Little Lottie will soon be home from school."

"No, work away," Janice said, rising. "I promised Lottie a ride in my car. I'll meet her before she comes in. I suppose she is as inquisitive as a magpie?"