"'Did you say,' he cried, 'she is growing old, and that you believe she
will continue to do so until she appears to be the lady of threescore
and ten she really is?'

"'Yes,' said Jaqui; 'that is what I said, and that is what I believe.'

"'Then, by all the holy angels,' cried Dr. Paltravi, jumping out of bed,
'she shall be my wife, and nobody else need concern himself about her.'"

"Hurrah!" cried the Daughter of the House, involuntarily springing to
her feet. "I was so afraid you would not come to that."

"I was bound to come to that, miss," said John Gayther.

"And did they really marry again?" asked the Mistress of the House.

"No," was the reply; "they did not. There was no need of it. The priests
assured them most emphatically that there was not the slightest need of
it. And so they came together again after this long interval, which had
been forty years to him, but which she had lived in forty days. If they
had been together all the time they could not have loved each other more
than they did now. To her eyes, so suddenly matured, there appeared a
handsome, stately old gentleman seventy years of age; to his eyes, from
which the visions of youth had been so suddenly removed, there appeared
a beautiful, stately old lady seventy-one years of age. It was just as
natural as if one of them had slept all day while the other had remained
awake; it was all the same to them both in the evening.

"She soon ceased to think how cruelly she had sent him away from her,
for she had been so young when she did it. And he now gave no thought to
what she had done, remembering how young she was when she did it. They
were as happy as though she had had all the past that rightfully
belonged to her, for he had had enough for both of them."

"And Jaqui?" asked the Mistress of the House.

"Oh, Jaqui was the happiest of the three of them, happy himself, and
happy in their happiness. Never again did he wish the lady in her box.
He looked no further for a smaller house which should contain but two
floors; he was as glad to stay where he was as they were to have him.
They were three very happy people, all of them greatly interested in the
progress of scientific investigation."

"And not one of them deserved to be happy," said the Daughter of the
House.

"But you must remember, miss, this is a story about realities," said the
gardener.

She sighed a little sigh; she knew that where realities are concerned
this sort of thing generally happens.

"That is a very good story, John," said the Mistress of the House,
rising from her seat; "but it seems to me that while you were talking
you sometimes thought of yourself as Jaqui."

"There is something in that, madam," answered the gardener; "it may have
been that during the story I sometimes did think that I myself might
have been Jaqui."

"Mamma," said the Daughter of the House, as the two walked out of the
garden, "don't you think that John Gayther is very intelligent?"

"I have always thought him remarkably intelligent," her mother replied.
"I have noticed that gardeners generally are a thoughtful, intelligent
race of men."

"I don't think it is so much the garden as because he has travelled so
much," said the young lady, "and I have a strange feeling that he has a
story of his own in the past. I wonder if he will ever tell it to me."

"If he has such a story," said the elder lady, "he will never tell it to
you."




                      THIS STORY IS TOLD BY

                    THE MISTRESS OF THE HOUSE

                          AND IS CALLED

                       THE COT AND THE RILL




IV

THE COT AND THE RILL


A week or so later the Daughter of the House came skipping down one of
the broad paths. John Gayther stood still and looked at her, glad to see
her coming, as he always was, no matter on what errand she came.

"John," she cried, before she reached him, "you are to stop work!" Then,
as she came up to him, she continued: "Yes; there is to be story-telling
this morning. We have told papa about it, and he is coming to what he
calls the story-telling place with us, and mamma feels inspired to tell
the story. So you may take that troubled look out of your face. Please
put the big easy garden-chair in the shade of the summer-house. Papa
does so like to be comfortable. And the view from there is so fine, you
know--a beautiful land view. Papa must be tired of sea views and shore
views, and here he will enjoy the mountains!"

Having delivered all this very volubly, the Daughter of the House
skipped away. And as John Gayther busied himself in making the
"story-telling place" attractive he felt glad that there were others
besides himself who liked to tell stories. There was such a thing as
overworking a mine. He was that rare thing, a story-teller who is also a
good listener. Moreover, John felt very diffident about telling one of
his stories before the Master of the House, who was a man prone to speak
his mind. Not that John disliked the Master of the House. Far from it.
He, with the family, was pleased when the Master of the House returned
from a long cruise and proceeded immediately to make himself very much
at home. For the Master of the House was a captain in the navy, and as
hearty, bluff, and good-natured as a captain should be.

The captain had been at home some days, and had been in the garden
several times, and now John Gayther was filled with admiration as he saw
this fine, sturdy figure, clad all in white, approach the summer-house.
With an air of supreme content this figure partly stretched itself in
the big garden-chair, while the two ladies seated themselves on the
bench. John Gayther stood respectfully until the Master of the House
motioned to him to sit on his stool.

"Good morning, John," he cried heartily. "We've piped all hands to
yarns. I have heard what you can do in this line, and we shall call upon
you before long. This time you are privileged to listen. You can let
somebody else cut your asparagus and dig your potatoes this morning."

"Papa," said his daughter, "it is too late for asparagus and too early
for potatoes. I am afraid you forget about these things when you are at
sea."

"Not at all," said her father. "On shipboard we cut our asparagus at any
time of the year. The steward does it with a big knife, which he jabs
through the covers of the tin cans. As for potatoes, they are always
with us."

The Mistress of the House was now prepared to tell her story.

"I am going to tell my story in the first person," she began.

"There is no better person," interrupted the Master of the House.

"I do not intend to describe my hero who is to tell the story,"
continued his wife. "I will only say that he is moderately young and
moderately handsome. Various other things about him you will find out as
the story goes on. Now, then, he begins thus: I was driving my wife in a
buggy in a mountainous region, and when we reached the top of a little
rise in the road, Anita put her hand on my arm. 'Stop,' she said; 'look
down there! That is what I like! It is a cot and a rill. You see that
cot--not much of a house, to be sure, but it would do. And there, just
near enough for the water to tumble over rocks and gurgle over stones to
soothe one to sleep on summer nights, is the rill--not much of a rill,
perhaps, but I think it could be arranged with a shovel. And then, all
the rest is enchanting. I had been looking at it for some time before I
spoke. There is a smooth meadow stretching away to a forest, and behind
that there are hills, and in the distance you can just see the
mountains. Now this is the place where I should like to live. Isn't
there any way of making those horses stand still for a minute?'

"I tried my persuasive powers on the animals, and succeeded moderately.
'To live?' I asked. 'And for how long?'

"'Until about the 3d of August,' she replied. 'That will be about three
weeks.'

"'You mean,' I said in surprise, 'something like this.'

"'I do not,' answered Anita. 'I mean this very spot. To find something
like it would require months. What I want, as I have told you over and
over again, is a real cot with a real rill, to which we can go now and
live for a little while that unsophisticated life for which my soul is
longing.'

"Anita and I were taking a summer outing together, and were trying to
get into free nature, away from people we knew, and had been several
days at a mountain hotel, and were driving about the country. My black
cobs now declined to stand any longer.

"'Drive them down into the valley. There must be a road to that house,'
said Anita.

"I drove on for a short distance, and soon came to a wagon-track which
descended to the little house. 'Anita,' said I, 'I cannot go down that
road; it is too rough and rocky, and we should break something. But why
do you want to go down there, anyhow? You are not in earnest about
living in such a place as that?'

"'But I am in earnest,' she answered sweetly but decisively. 'I want to
stay in this region and explore it. We both of us hate hotels, and I
could be very happy in a cot like that (a little arranged, perhaps)
until the 3d of August, when we have to go North. But I won't ask you to
go down that road, of course. Suppose we come again to-morrow with some
quieter horses.'

"'I am sorry,' said I, 'but I cannot do that. Mr. Baxter comes
to-morrow. You know it was planned that he should always come Tuesdays.'

"She sighed. 'I suppose everything must give way to business,' she said,
'and I shall have to wait until Wednesday. But one thing must certainly
be agreed upon: when we get to that cot there must be no more Mr. Baxter;
you can certainly plan for that, can't you?'

"I made no immediate reply, because I was busy turning the horses in
rather an awkward place; but when we were on the smooth highway and were
trotting gayly back to the hotel, I discussed the matter more fully with
Anita, and I found that what she had been talking about was not a mere
fancy. Before coming to this picturesque mountain region she had set her
heart upon some sort of camping out in the midst of real nature, and
this cot-and-rill business seemed to suit her exactly.

"'I want to go there and live,' she said; 'but I do not mean any Marie
Antoinette business, with milk-pails decked with ribbons, and dainty
little straw hats. I want to live in a cot like a cotter--that is, for
us to live like two cotters. As for myself, I need it; my moral and
physical natures demand it. I must have a change, an absolute change,
and this is just what I want. I would shut out entirely the world I live
in, and it is only in a real and true cot that this can be done as I
want to do it.'

"She talked a great deal more on the same subject, and then I told her
that if it suited her it suited me, and that on the day after to-morrow
we would drive out again and examine the cot. For the rest of the day
and the greater part of the evening Anita talked of nothing but her
projected life in the valley; and before I went to sleep I was quite as
much in love with it as she was. The next day it rained, but Mr. Baxter
came all the same; weather never interfered with him."

"Who in the name of common sense is Mr. Baxter?" asked the Master of the
House. "I like to know who people are when I am being told what they
do."

"I had hoped," said the Mistress of the House, "that I should be able
to tell my story so you would find out for yourselves all about the
characters, just as in real life if you see a man working in a garden
you know he is a gardener."

"But he may not be," said her husband; "he may be a coachman pulling
carrots for his horses."

"But, as you wish it," continued the Mistress of the House, "I do not
mind telling you that Mr. Baxter was my hero's right-hand man and
business manager. And now he will go on:

"After Baxter and I had finished our business I told him about the cot,
for if we carried out Anita's plan it would be necessary for him to know
where we were. Then, putting on waterproof coats, we rode over to the
place which had excited my wife's desire to become a cotter. We found
the house small but in good order, with four rooms and an adjunct at one
end. There were vines growing over it, and at the side of it a garden--a
garden with an irregular hedge around two sides; it was a poor sort of a
garden, mostly weeds, I thought, as I glanced at it. The stream of water
was a pretty little brook, and Baxter, who rode to the head of it, said
he thought it could be made much better.

"The house was the home of a widow with a grown-up daughter and a son
about fifteen. We talked to them, asking a great many questions about
the surrounding country, and then retired to consult. We did not
consider long; in less than ten minutes I had ordered Baxter to buy the
house and everything in it, if the people were willing to sell; and then
to purchase as much land around it as would be necessary to carry out my
plans, which I then and there imparted to him in a general way, leaving
him to attend to the details."

"Your nameless hero," said the Master of the House, "must have been in
very comfortable circumstances."

"I am glad to see that my story is explaining itself," remarked his
wife, and she continued:

"Baxter looked serious for a moment, and said it was a big piece of
work; but he did not decline it. Baxter never declined anything.

"'How much time can you give me?' he asked.

"'My wife will want to look at the place to-morrow,' I replied; 'that
is, if it does not rain: for she says she does not want to see it first
in bad weather.'

"'That's a help,' said Baxter. 'The Weather Bureau promises east winds
and rains for to-morrow and perhaps the next day. And, anyway, I know
now what you want. I will go back to town by the one-o'clock train and
start things going.'

"'There is one thing I object to,' said I, when we were on the country
road from which Anita had first seen the cot and the rill: 'the house
is in full view from this road. Before we know it we will be making
ourselves spectacles to parties from the hotel who happen to discover
us and drive out to see how we are getting on.'

"Baxter reflected. 'Oh, I can arrange that,' said he. 'I know this road;
it turns again into the highway not far below here. It is really a
private road for the benefit of this house and two others nearly a mile
farther on. I will include those places in the purchase, and close up
the road. Then I will make it a private entrance to this place, with a
locked gate. Will that do?'

"'Very well,' said I, laughing. 'But I suppose people could cut across
the country and come in at the other end of the road if they really
wanted to look into the valley?'

"'Not after I have finished the job,' said Baxter; and I asked no
further questions."

"May I inquire," said the captain, "if that Mr. Baxter is in want of a
position?"

"I am afraid, papa," said the Daughter of the House, "that you would
have to own a navy before you could employ him."

The gardener smiled. A story built upon these lines interested him. The
Mistress of the House went on without regard to the interruptions:

"I found Anita in earnest consultation with her maid Maria and the
mistress of the hotel, and it was at least an hour before she could see
me. When I told her I had secured the cot, or at least arranged to do
so, she was pleased and grateful, especially as I had had to go out into
the rain to do it. 'I knew, of course,' she said, 'that Baxter would
settle that all right, and so I have been making my arrangements. But
there is one favor I want you to grant me: I don't want you to ask me
anything about how I am going to manage matters. I don't want to deceive
you in any possible way, and so if you do not ask me any questions it
will make it easier for me.'

"'Very good,' I replied; 'and I shall ask a similar favor of you.'

"'All right,' said Anita. 'And now that matter is settled.'

"The prophecies of the weather were correct. The next day, Wednesday, it
rained, and it also rained on Thursday and Friday; but on Saturday it
looked as if it might clear in the afternoon.

"'I am not going to-day,' said Anita. 'I have been working very hard
lately, and to-morrow I will take a good rest, and we will start in on
Monday.'

"Baxter was very glad of the four days of delay occasioned by the stormy
weather, and said that without working on Sunday he could finish
everything to his satisfaction. I went down to the cot the next day to
see how he was getting on; but Anita asked me no questions, and I asked
none of her. I had never known her to be so continuously occupied. As I
stood with Baxter in front of the cottage, where there was a fine view
of the surrounding country, I asked him how much land he had thought it
desirable to purchase.

"'Over there,' he said, 'I bought just beyond that range of trees, about
half a mile, I should say. But to the west a little more, just skirting
the highroad. To the north I bought to the river, which is three
quarters of a mile. But over there to the south I included that stretch
of forest-land which extends to the foot-hills of the mountains; the
line must be about a mile from here.'

"'That is a very large tract,' said I. 'How did you manage to buy it so
quickly?'

"'I had nine real-estate agents here on Thursday morning,' he replied,
'and the sales were all consummated this morning. They all went to work
at once, each on a separate owner. We bought for cash, and no one knew
his neighbor was selling.'

"I laughed, and asked him how he was going to keep this big estate
private for our use. 'We want to wander free, you know, anywhere and
everywhere.'

"'That is what I thought,' said he, 'and that is why I took in such a
variety of scenery. Nobody will interfere with you. There will be no
inhabited house on the place except your own, and I am putting up a
fence of chicken-yard wire around the whole estate. There is nothing
like chicken-yard wire. It is six feet high and very difficult to climb
over, and it is also troublesome to cut.'

"I exclaimed in amazement: 'That will take a long time!'

"'I have contracted to have it done by Saturday morning,' replied
Baxter. 'The train with the wire fence and posts is scheduled to arrive
here at eleven o'clock to-night, and work will begin immediately. Paulo
Montani, the Italian boss who has worked for me before, has taken this
contract, and will put twelve hundred men on.'

"'The train will arrive here?' said I. 'What do you mean?'

"'The M. B. & T. line runs within a mile and a half of this place, and
my trains will all be switched off at a convenient place near here.'

"'I would not have supposed there was a side-track there,' I remarked.

"'Oh, no,' he replied, 'there was none; but I am now having two built.
All the different gangs of men will sleep on the freight-cars, which
have been fitted up with bunks. The wood-cutters and the landscape-men,
hedgers, sodders, and all that arrived about an hour ago, and I am
expecting the mechanics' train late this afternoon. The gardeners will
not arrive until to-morrow; but if it keeps on raining, that will give
them time enough. They want wet weather for their work.'"

"Excuse me," said the Master of the House, who had now finished his
cigar and was sitting upright in his chair, "but didn't you omit to
state that your hero was the King of Siam?"

"I have nothing of the kind to state," answered his wife. "He is merely
an American gentleman.

"When I heard of the great works that were going on, I exclaimed: 'Look
here, Baxter, you must be careful about what you are doing. If you make
this place look like a vast cemetery, all laid out in smooth grass and
gravelled driveways, my wife won't like it. She wants to live in a cot,
and she wants everything to be cottish and naturally rural.'

"'That is just what I am going to make it,' said he. 'The highest grade
of true naturalism is what I am aiming at in house and grounds.
To-morrow afternoon you can look at the house. Everything will be done
then, and the furniture will all be in place, and if you want any change
there will be time enough.'

"The next day I went to the cot; but before I reached it I stopped.
'Baxter,' I said, 'you have done very well with this rill; it is quite a
roaring little torrent.'

"'Yes,' said he; 'and down below they are working on some waterfalls,
but they are not quite finished.'

"When I reached the house I did not exactly comprehend what I saw; it
was the same house, and yet it was entirely different. It seemed to have
grown fifty years older than it was when I first saw it. Its color was
that of wood beautifully stained by age. There was a low piazza I had
not noticed, which was covered with vines. Bright-colored old-fashioned
flowers were growing in beds close to the house, and there was a
pathway, bordered by box bushes, which led from the front door to a
gateway in a stone wall which partly surrounded the green little yard. I
had not noticed before the gateway or the stone wall, on which grew
bitter-sweet vines and Virginia creeper.

"'Now, you see,' said Baxter, 'this grass here is not smooth green turf,
fresh from the lawn-mower. It is natural grass, with wild flowers in it
here and there. Nearly all of it was brought from a meadow about a mile
away from here. But now step inside a minute. Everything there is of the
period of 1849: horsehair, you see, lots of black walnut, color all
toned down, and all the ornaments covered with netting to keep the flies
off.'

"I was interested and amused; but I told Baxter I did not want to see
everything now; I wished to enjoy the place with my wife when we should
come to it. He was doing admirably, and I would leave everything to him.
As I stood on the little portico and looked over the valley, I saw what
seemed to be a regiment of men coming out of the woods and crossing a
field.

"'That is the first division of the wire-fence men,' said Baxter,
'going to supper. They are divided into three sections, and one gang
relieves another, so that the work is kept going all night by
torchlight.'

"As I went away Baxter called my attention to the gate at the entrance
of our road. It was of light iron, and it could be opened into a clump
of bushes where it was not likely to be noticed. 'If this gate is
locked,' said I, 'it might make trouble; it may be necessary for some
one to go in or out.'

"'Oh,' said Baxter, 'I have provided for all that. You know Baldwin, who
used to superintend your Lake George gardens? I have put him in charge
of this gate, and have lodged him in a tent over there in the woods. He
will know who to let in.'

"On Monday morning Anita rose very early, and was dressed and ready for
breakfast before I woke. The day was a fine one, and her spirits were
high. 'You have not the slightest idea,' she said, 'how I am going to
surprise you when we get to the cot.' I told her I had no doubt her
surprise would be very pleasant, and there I let the matter drop. Soon
after breakfast we drove over to the cot, this time with a coachman on
the box. When we arrived at the gate, which was open and out of sight, I
proposed to Anita that she should send the carriage back and walk to the
cot.

"'Good,' said she; 'I do not want to see a carriage for two weeks.'

"I have not time to speak of Anita's delight at everything she saw. She
was amazed that plain people such as I had told her owned the house
should have lived in such a simple, natural way. 'Everything exactly
suits everything else,' she said. 'And it is all so cheap and plain.
There is absolutely nothing that does not suit a cot.' She was wild with
excitement, and ran about like a girl; and when I followed her into the
garden, which I had not seen, I found her in one of the box-bordered
paths, clapping her hands. The place was indeed very pretty, filled with
old-fashioned flowers and herbs and hop-poles, and all sorts of country
plants and blossoms.

"At last we returned to the house. 'Now, Anita,' said I, 'we are here in
our little cot--'

"'Where we are going to be as happy as two kittens,' she interrupted.

"'And as I want everything to suit you,' I continued, 'I am going to
leave the whole matter of the domestic arrangements in your hands. You
have seen the house, and you will know what will be necessary to do.
Mention what servants you want, and I will send for them.'

"'First tell me,' said Anita, 'what you did with the people who were
here? You said there were three of them.'

"I could not very well answer this question, for I did not know exactly
what Baxter had done with them. I was inclined to think, however, that
he had sent them to the hotel until arrangements could be made for them
to go somewhere else. But I was able to assure Anita that they had gone
away.

"'Good,' said she. 'I have been thinking about them, and I was afraid
they might find some reason or other to stay about the place, and that
would interfere with my plans. And now I will tell you what servants I
want. I don't want any. I am going to do the work of this house myself.
Now don't open your mouth so wide. There is nothing to frighten you in
what I have said. I am thirty-two years old, and although I am not very
large, I am perfectly strong and healthy, and I cannot imagine anything
in this world that would give me more pleasure than to live in this cot
with you for two weeks, and to cook our meals and do everything that is
necessary to be done. There are thousands and hundreds of thousands of
women who do all that and are just as happy as they can be. That is the
kind of happiness I have never had, and I want it now.'

"I sat upright in my slippery horsehair chair and spoke no word. Surely
Anita had astonished me more than I could possibly astonish her! Before
me sat my beautiful wife: the mistress of my great house in town, with
its butlers and footmen, its maids and its men, its horses, its
carriages, its grand company, and its stately hospitality; the lady of
my famous country estate, with more butlers and footmen and gardeners
and stewards and maids and men and stables and carriages and herds and
flocks, its house-parties of distinguished guests--here was this wife
of mine, so well known in so many fashionable centres; a social star
at home and abroad; a delicately reared being, always surrounded by
servitors of every grade, who had never found it necessary to stoop to
pick up so much as a handkerchief or a rosebud; and here was this
superfine lady of high degree, who had just announced to me that she
intended to cook our meals, to pare our potatoes, to wash our dishes,
and, probably, to sweep our floors. No wonder I opened my mouth.

"'I hope, now,' said Anita, putting her feet out in front of her to
keep herself from slipping off the horsehair sofa, 'that you thoroughly
understand. I do not want any assistance while we are in this cot. I
have sent away Maria, who has gone to visit her parents, and no woman in
service is to come on this place while I am here. I have been studying
hard with Mrs. Parker at the hotel, who seems to be an excellent
housekeeper and accustomed to homely fare, and I have learned how to
make and to cook a great many things which are simple and nutritious; I
have had appropriate dresses made, and Maria has gone to town and bought
me a great variety of household linen, all good and plain, for our
damask table-cloths would look perfectly ridiculous here. I have also
laid in a great many other things which you will see from time to
time.'"

"What a wonderful moment this would have been for a great slump in
stocks!" remarked the Master of the House. "Everything swept away but
the cot and the rill and the dear little wife with her coarse linen and
her determination to keep no servant. The husband of your Anita would
have been the luckiest fellow on Wall Street. If I were working on this
story I would have the blackest of Black Fridays just here."

"'Now, Harold,' said Anita, 'I do not in the least intend to impose upon
you. Because I choose to work is no reason why you should be compelled
to do so.'

"'I am glad to hear that,' said I.

"'I knew you would be,' continued Anita. 'But of course neither of us
will want very much done for us if we live a cotter's life with these
simple surroundings, and so I think one man will be quite enough to do
for you all you will want done. But of course if you think it necessary
to have two I shall not object.'

"'One will be enough,' said I, 'and I will see about sending for him
this afternoon.'

"'I am so glad,' said Anita, 'that you have not got him now, for we can
have our first meal in the cot all by ourselves. I'll run up-stairs and
dress, and then I will come down and do my first cooking.'

"In a very short time Anita appeared in a neat dress of coarse blue
stuff, a little short in the skirts, with a white apron over it.

"'Come, now,' said she, gayly, 'let us go into the kitchen and see what
we shall have for dinner. Shall it be dinner or lunch? Cotters dine
about noon.'

"'Oh, make it lunch,' said I. 'I am hungry, and I do not want to wait to
get up a dinner.' Anita agreed to this, and we went to work to take the
lid off a hamper which she told me had been packed by Mrs. Parker and
contained everything we should want for several days.

"'Besides,' she said, 'that widow woman has left no end of things, all
in boxes and cans, labelled. She must have been a very thrifty person,
and it was an excellent piece of business to buy the house just as it
stood, with everything in it.'

"Anita found it difficult to make a choice of what she should cook for
luncheon. 'Suppose we have some tea?'

"'Very good,' said I, for I knew that was easy to make.

"'Then,' said she, on her knees beside the hamper, with her forefinger
against her lips, 'suppose--suppose we have some croquettes. I know how
to make some very plain and simple croquettes out of--'

"'Oh, don't let us do that,' said I; 'they will take too long, and I am
hungry.'

"'Very well, then,' said Anita. 'Let us have some boiled eggs; they are
quick.'

"I agreed to this.

"'The next thing,' said Anita, 'is bread and butter. Would you like some
hot soda-biscuit?'

"'No,' said I; 'you would have to make some dough and find the soda,
and--isn't there anything ready baked?'

"'Oh, yes,' she answered; 'we have Albert biscuit and--'

"'Albert biscuit will do,' I interrupted.

"'Now,' said she, 'we will soon have our first meal in the cot.'

"'This is a very unassuming lunch,' she said, when we were at last
seated at the table, 'but I am going to give you a nice dinner. If you
want more than three eggs I will cook you some in a few minutes. I put
another stick of wood in the fire so as to keep the water hot.'

"I was in considerable doubt as to what sort of man it would be best
for us to have. I would have been very glad to have my special valet,
because he was an extremely handy man in many ways; but I thought it
better to consider a little before sending for him: he might be
incongruous. I had plenty of time to consider, for Anita occupied nearly
the whole afternoon in getting up our dinner. She was very enthusiastic
about it, and did not want me to help her at all, except to make a fire
in the stove. After that, she said, everything would be easy. The wood
was all in small pieces and piled up conveniently near. As I glanced
around the kitchen I saw that Baxter had had this little room fitted up
with every possible culinary requirement.

"We had dinner a little before eight. Anita sat down, hot, red, but
radiant with happiness.

"'Now, then,' said she, 'you will find I have prepared for you a
high-grade cotter's dinner; by which I mean that it is a meal which all
farmers or country people might have every day if they only knew enough,
or were willing to learn. I have looked over several books on the
subject, and Mrs. Parker told me a great deal. Maria told me a great
many things also. They were both poor in early life, and knew what they
were talking about. First we will have soup--a plain vegetable soup. I
went into the garden and picked the vegetables myself.'

"'I wish you had asked me to do that,' said I.

"'Oh, no,' she answered; 'I do not intend to be inferior to any
countrywoman. Then there is roast chicken. After that a lettuce salad
with mayonnaise dressing; I do not believe cotters have mayonnaise
dressing, nor shall we every day; but this is an exceptional meal. For
the next course I have made a pie, and then we shall have black coffee.
If you want wine you can get a bottle from the wine-hamper; but I shall
not take any: I intend to live consistently through the whole of this
experience.'

"There was something a little odd about the soup: it tasted as if a
variety of vegetables had been washed in it and then the vegetables
thrown away. I removed the soup-plates while Anita went out to get the
next course. When she put the dish on the table she said something had
given way while the fowl was cooking, and it had immediately stuck its
legs high in the air. 'It looks funny,' she remarked, 'but in carving
you can cut the legs off first.'

"I found one side of the fowl much better cooked than the other,--in
fact, I should have called it kiln-dried,--and the other side had
certainly been warmed. The mayonnaise was very peculiar and made me
think of the probable necessity of filling the lamps, and I hoped Baxter
had had this attended to. The pie was made of gooseberry jam, the
easiest pie in the world to make, Anita told me. 'You take the jam just
as it is, and put it between two layers of dough, and then bake it.' The
coffee was very like black writing-ink, and, having been made for a long
time, was barely tepid.

"Strange as it may appear, however, I ate a hearty dinner. I was very
hungry.

"'Now,' said Anita, as she folded her napkin, 'I do not believe you have
enjoyed this dinner half as much as I enjoyed the cooking of it, and I
am not going to wash up anything, for I will not deprive myself of the
pleasure of sitting with you while you smoke your after-dinner cigar on
the front porch. These dishes will not be wanted until to-morrow, and if
you will take hold of one end of the table we will set it against the
wall. There is a smaller table which will do for our breakfast.'

"I drank several glasses of wine as I smoked, but I did not feel any
better. If I had known what was going to happen I should have preferred
to go hungry. I did not tell Anita I was not feeling well, for that
would have made her suffer in mind more than I was suffering in body;
but when I had finished my smoke, and she had gone into the house to
light the parlor lamp, I hurried over to the barn, where Baxter had had
a telephone put up, and I called him up in town, and told him to send me
a chef who could hoe and dig a little in the garden.

"'I thought you would want a man of that kind,' Baxter telephoned. 'Will
Isadore do? He is at your town house now, and can leave by the
ten-o'clock train.'

"I knew Isadore. He was the second chef in my town house, a man of much
experience, and good-natured. I told Baxter to make him understand what
sort of place he was coming to, and to send him on without delay.

"'Do you want him to live in the house?' asked Baxter. And I replied
that I did not.

"'Very good,' said he; 'I will have a tent put up for him near
Baldwin's.'

"When I went to the house I told Anita I had engaged a man.

"'I am glad,' said she; 'but I have just thought of something: I cannot
possibly cook for a man.'

"'Oh, you won't have to do that,' I answered. 'He will live near here,
just the other side of the road.'

"'That will do very well,' said she. 'I do not mind being your servant,
Harold, but I cannot be a servant's servant.'"

"Do you know," said the Master of the House, "as this story goes on I
feel poorer and poorer every minute--I suppose by comparison. In fact, I
do not know that I can afford to light another cigar. But one thought
comforts me," he continued: "if I had been living in that cot with my
wife I would not have had the stomach-ache; so that balances things
somewhat."

The lady smiled.

"The next morning a little after eight o'clock I came down to open the
house, and there, standing by the porch, hat in hand, I saw Isadore.
He was a middle-aged man, large and solid, with very flat feet and a
smoothly shaven face, twinkling eyes, and a benevolent smile. I was very
glad to see him, especially before breakfast. I took him away from the
house, so that Anita might not overhear our conversation, and then I
laid the whole case before him. He was an Alsatian, but his English was
perfectly easy to understand.

"'I know precisely what it is that is wanted,' said he, 'and Mr. Baxter
has made the arrangements with me. It is that madame shall not suppose
anything, but that what she wishes to be done shall be done.'

"'That is the idea,' said I. 'Don't interfere with her, but have
everything done all right.'

"'And I am to be man of all work. I like that. You shall see that I am
charmed. Now I will go and change my clothes.' And this well-dressed man
turned away toward Baldwin's tent.

"When Anita came down the servant I had engaged was at the kitchen door
waiting for orders. He was a plainly dressed man, his whole appearance
neat but humble. 'He looks like a foreigner,' said Anita.

"'You are right,' I replied; 'he is an Alsatian.'

"'And his name?'

"I was about to tell her Isadore, but I stopped myself. It was barely
possible that she might have heard the name of the man who for two years
had composed the peculiar and delicious ices of which she was so fond;
she might even have seen him, and the name might call up some
recollection. 'Did you say your name was Isaac?' I called out to the
man.

"'Yes, sir,' he answered; 'it is that. I am Isaac.'

"'I am going to get breakfast,' said Anita. 'Do you suppose he can build
a fire?'

"'Oh, yes,' I replied; 'that is what he is engaged for--to be the man of
all work.'

"Prompted by curiosity, I shortly afterwards looked in at the kitchen
door. 'While you prepare the table, madame,' the man of all work was
saying, 'shall I arrange the coffee for the hot water?'

"'Do you know how to do it?' she asked.

"'Oh, yes, madame,' the good Isaac replied. 'In a little hut in Alsace,
where I was born, I was obliged to learn to do all things. My father and
my mother had no daughter, and I had to be their daughter as well as
their son. I learn to cook the simple food. I milk the cow, I rub the
horse, I dig in the garden, I pick the berries in the woods.' As he
talked Isaac was not idle; he was busy with the coffee.

"'That is very interesting,' said Anita to me; 'where there are no
daughters among the poor the sons must learn a great deal.'

"I remained at the kitchen door to see what would happen next. There was
a piece of dough upon a floury board, and when Anita went to lay the
table the Alsatian fairly flew upon the dough. It was astonishing to see
with what rapidity he manipulated it. When Anita came back she took the
dough and divided it into four portions. 'There will be two rolls apiece
for us,' she said. 'And now, Isaac, will you put them into the stove?
The back part is where we bake things. We are going to have some lamb
chops and an omelet,' she said to me as she approached the hamper.

"'Ah, madame,' cried the Alsatian, 'allow me to lift the chops. The raw
meat will make your fingers smell.'

"'That is true,' said Anita; 'you may take them out.' And then she went
back to the dining-room.

"Isaac knelt by the hamper. Then he lifted his eyes to the skies and
involuntarily exclaimed: '_Oh, tonnerre!_ They were not put by the ice.'
And he gave a melancholy sniff. 'But they will be all right,' he said,
turning to me. 'Have trust.' The man of all work handled the chops, and
offered to beat the omelet; but Anita would not let him do this: she
made it herself, a book open beside her as she did so. Then she told
Isaac to put it on the stove, and asked if I were ready for breakfast.
As she turned to leave the room I saw her assistant whip her omelet off
the stove and slip on it another one. When or where he had made it I had
no idea; it must have been while she was looking for the sugar.

"'A most excellent breakfast,' said I, when the meal was over; and I
spoke the exact truth.

"'Yes,' said Anita; 'but I think I shall do better after I have had more
practice. I wonder if that man really can wash dishes.' On being
questioned, Isaac declared that in the humble cot in which he was born
he had been obliged to wash dishes; there were no daughters, and his
mother was infirm.

"'That is good; and if any of the plates need a little rubbing up
afterwards I can do them,' said Anita. 'Now we will take a walk over the
place, which we have not done yet.'

"When we returned Isaac was working in the garden. Anita went into the
house, and then the man of all work approached me; he had in his hand a
little piece of red earthenware, which he held up before me in one hand
and touched his cap with the other. 'Sir,' said he, 'is it all pots?
Grass, bushes, everything?'

"'Oh, no,' said I. 'What is the matter?'

"'Excuse me,' said he, 'but everywhere I work in the garden I strike
pots, and I broke this one. But I will be more careful; I will not rub
so deep.'

"For two or three days Anita and I enjoyed ourselves greatly. We walked,
we sat in the shade, we lay in hammocks, we read novels. 'That man,'
said Anita, 'is of the greatest possible assistance to me. The fact is
that, having been taught to do all sorts of things in his infancy, he
does the hard work of the kitchen, and all that is necessary for me to
do is to give the finishing touches.'

"That afternoon, when I saw the well-known chef Isadore--for some years
head cook to the Duke of Oxminster, and willing to accept a second place
in the culinary department of my town house only on account of
extraordinary privileges and emoluments--when I saw this man of genius
coming down the hill carrying a heavy basket which probably contained
meats packed in ice, I began to wonder about two things: in the first
place, I wondered what exceptional remuneration in addition to his
regular salary Baxter had offered Monsieur Isadore in return for his
exceptional services in our cot; and in the second place, I wondered if
it were exactly fair to practise such a variety of deceptions upon
Anita. But I quieted my conscience by assuring it that I was doing
everything for her benefit and happiness, particularly in regard to this
man of all work, who was probably saving us from chronic dyspepsia.
Besides, it was perfectly fair play, for if she had told me she was
going to do all my cooking I never would have come to this cot.

"It was that evening, when we were both in a good humor after a good
dinner, that my wife somewhat disturbed my peace of mind. 'Everything is
going on so smoothly and in such a pastoral and delightful way,' said
she, 'that I want some of our friends to visit us. I want them to see
for themselves how enjoyable such a life as this is. I do not believe
any of them know anything about it.'

"'Friends!' I exclaimed. 'We do not want people here. We cannot
entertain them. Such a thing was never contemplated by either of us, I
am sure.'

"'That is true,' said Anita; 'but things are different from what I
expected. They are ever and ever so much better. And we can entertain
people. We have a guest-room which is fitted up and furnished as well as
ours is. If we are satisfied, I am sure anybody ought to be. I tell you
who will be a good person to invite for the first one--Mr. Rounders.'

"'Rounders!' I exclaimed. 'He is the last man in the world for a guest
in this cot.'

"'No, he is not,' answered Anita. 'He would like it very much indeed. He
would be perfectly willing and glad to do anything you do, and to live
in any way you live. Besides, he told me, not very long ago, that he
often thought of the joys of an humble life, without care, without
anxiety, enough, no more, and a peaceful mind.'

"'Very well,' said I; 'this is your picnic, and we will have Rounders
and his wife.'

"'No, indeed,' said Anita, very emphatically. 'She cannot come anyway,
because she is in Europe. But I would not have her if she were here. If
he comes, he is to come alone. Shall I write him a note, or will you?
There is no time to waste.'

"She wrote the note, and when it was finished Isaac carried it to
Baldwin and told him to have it mailed.

"The more I thought about this invitation the more interested I became
in it. No one could be more unsuited to a cotter's life than Godfrey
Rounders. He was a rich man of middle age, but he was different from any
other rich man with whom I was acquainted. It was impossible to talk to
him or even to be with him for five minutes without perceiving that he
was completely controlled by the money habit. He knew this, but he could
not help it. In business resorts, in society, and in the clubs he met
great capitalists, millionaires, and men of wealth of all degrees,
who were gentlemen, scholars, kind and deferential in manner, and
unobtrusive in dress, and not to be distinguished, so far as
conversation or appearance could serve as guides, from those high types
of gentlemen which are recognized all over the world. Rounders longed to
be like one of these, but he found it to be impossible. He was too old
to reform, and the money habit had such a hold over him that I believe
even when he slept he was conscious of his wealth. He was not a coarse,
vulgar Dives: he had the instincts of a gentleman; but these were
powerless. The consciousness of money showed itself on him like a
perspiration; wipe his brows as he might, it always reappeared.

"He had not been poor in his early life; his father was a man of
moderate means, and Rounders had never known privations and hardships;
but, in his intense desire to make people think that his character had
not been affected by his money, he sometimes alluded to straits and
difficulties he had known in early days, of which he was not now in the
least ashamed. But he was so careful to keep these incidents free from
any suspicion of real hardships or poverty that he always failed to make
the impression he desired. I have seen him quite downcast after an
interview with strangers, and I was well aware what was the matter with
him. He knew that, in spite of his attempts to conceal the domination of
his enslaving habit, these people had discovered it. Considering all
this, I came to believe it would please Rounders very much to come to
stay a few days with us. Life in a cot, without any people to wait upon
him, would be a great thing for him to talk about; it might help to make
some people believe that he was getting the better of his money habit.

"In the middle of the night I happened to wake, then I happened to think
of Rounders, then I happened to think of a story Baxter had told me, and
then I burst out into a loud laugh. Fortunately Anita did not awake; she
merely talked in her sleep, and turned over. The story Baxter had told
me was this: In the past winter I had given a grand dinner, and
Rounders was one of the guests. Isadore's specialty was ices, pastry,
salads, and all sorts of delicate preparations, and he had excelled
himself on this occasion, especially in the matter of sweets. At an
unhappy moment Rounders had said to his neighbor that if she could taste
the sort of thing she was eating as his cook made it she would know what
it really ought to be. An obliging butler carried this remark to
Monsieur Isadore as he was sipping his wine in his dressing-gown and
slippers. The interesting part of this anecdote was Baxter's description
of Isadore's rage. The furious cook took a cab and drove directly to
Baxter's hotel. The wording of Monsieur Isadore's volcanic remarks I
cannot state, but he butchered, cut up, roasted, carved, peppered, and
salted Rounders's moral and social character in such a masterly way that
Baxter laughed himself hoarse. The fiery cook would have left my service
then and there if Baxter had not assured him that if the gilded reptile
ever dined with him again Isadore should be informed beforehand, that he
might have nothing to do with anything that went on the table. In
consequence of this promise, Monsieur Isadore, having withdrawn a
deposit of several thousand dollars from one of the trust companies with
which Rounders was connected, consented to remain in my household.

"'Now, then,' I asked myself, 'how are we going to get along with
Rounders and my man of all work Isaac?' But the invitation had gone, and
there was no help for it. I concluded, and I think wisely, that it would
be unkind to trouble Anita by telling her anything about this
complication, but I would prepare the mind of the good Isaac.

"I went into the garden the next morning, where our man of all work was
gathering vegetables, and when I told him that Mr. Godfrey Rounders was
coming to spend a few days with us the face of Isadore--for it was
impossible at that moment to think of him as Isaac--was a wonderful
sight to see: his brows contracted, his countenance darkened, and his
eyes flashed as though they were about to shoot out lightning. Then all
color, even his natural ruddiness, departed from his face. He bowed
gravely.

"'I have heard it said you have taken some sort of dislike to
Mr. Rounders,' said I; 'and while I have nothing to do with it, and do
not want to know anything about it, I do not wish to force you into an
unpleasant position, and if you would rather go away while Mr. Rounders
is here, I will have some one sent to take your place until he leaves.
Then we shall want you back again. In this unusual position you have
acquitted yourself most admirably.'

"While I was speaking Isadore had been thinking hard and fast; it was
easy to see this by the varied expressions which swept over his face.
When I had finished he spoke quite blandly:

"'It is that it would be beneath me, sir, to allow any of the dislike
of mine to interfere with the comfort or the pleasure of yourself and
madame. I beg that you will not believe that I will permit myself even
to think of such a thing. I remain so long as it is that you wish me. Is
it that you intend that your visitor shall know my position in your town
house?'