Kitabı oku: «Patty's Summer Days», sayfa 12

CHAPTER XXIII
THE END OF THE SUMMER

“Whew!” said Dick Phelps, in his straightforward way, “he’s mad at you, isn’t he?”

“Yes,” said Patty, “and it’s so silly! All about nothing at all. I wish you’d take me back to him, Mr. Phelps, and leave us alone, and I think I can straighten matters out in two minutes.”

“Indeed, I’ll do nothing of the sort,” returned Mr. Phelps, in his masterful way; “you promised to go to the photograph place, and that’s where we’re going. I don’t propose to give you up to any young man we chance to meet!”

Patty laughed, and they went on. At the photograph booth they found many of the gaily dressed young people, anxious to have pictures of themselves in their pretty costumes. Patty and Mr. Phelps had to wait their turn, but finally succeeded in getting a number of pictures. Patty had some taken alone, and some in which she was one of a gay group. Some were successful portraits, and others were not, but all were provocative of much laughter and fun. By a rapid process of development, the photographers were enabled to furnish the completed pictures in less than a half hour after the cameras did their work, and as a consequence, this booth was exceedingly popular and promised handsome returns for the benefit of charity.

Mr. Phelps and Patty loitered about, waiting for their pictures, when Patty caught sight of Nan, and running to her she said, “For goodness’ sake, Nan, do help me out! Kenneth’s as mad as hops, and all about nothing! Now I want you to ask him to come to supper with our crowd, and you must make him come!”

“I can’t make him come, if he doesn’t want to. You’ve been teasing him, Patty, and you must get out of your own scrapes.”

“Ah, Nan, dear,” coaxed Patty, “do be good, and truly, if you’ll just persuade him to come to supper with us, I’ll do the rest.”

“I’ll try,” said Nan as she walked away, “but I won’t promise that I’ll succeed.”

She did succeed, however, and some time later Mr. Fairfield gathered the large party whom he had invited to supper, in the English Dairy.

The supper was to be a fine one, far exceeding the bounds of Dairy fare, and Mr. Fairfield had reserved a long table for his guests.

As they trooped in, laughing and talking, and seated themselves for the feast, Patty was relieved to see that Kenneth was among them, after all.

He took a seat between Elise and Helen Barlow, and knowing Bumble’s good nature, Patty went directly to her, and asked her if she wouldn’t move, as she wanted to sit there herself.

“Of course I will,” said Bumble, and jumping up, she ran around to the other side of the table.

Then Patty deliberately sat down by Kenneth, who couldn’t very well get up and walk away, himself, though he looked at her with no expression of welcome in his glance.

Without a word, Patty leaned over and selected from a dish of olives on the table one which had a stem to it.

With a tiny bit of ribbon she tied the olive to a little green branch she had brought in with her, and then demurely held the token toward Kenneth.

For a moment the boy looked rather blank, and then realising that Patty was offering him the olive branch of peace, and that she had gone to some trouble to do this, and that moreover she had done it rather cleverly, the boy’s face broke into a smile, and he turned toward Patty.

“Thank you,” he said, as he took the little spray, and attached it to the rolling collar of his blouse. “I accept it, with its full meaning.”

“You’re such a goose, Kenneth!” said Patty, her eyes dancing with laughter. “There was nothing to get huffy about.”

“Well,” said Kenneth, feeling his grounds for complaint slipping away from him, “you pranced off with that Roland chap, after you had just told me you couldn’t leave your gypsy queen business.”

“I know it,” said Patty, “but Ken, he brought a nice lady to fill my place, and besides, he asked me to go to get red flowers and I really wanted red flowers.”

“I asked you to go for flowers too,” said Kenneth, not yet entirely mollified.

“Yes,” said Patty, “but you didn’t say red flowers. How did I know but that you’d buy pink or blue ones, and so spoil my whole gypsy costume?”

Kenneth had to laugh in spite of himself, at this bit of audacity. “And then right afterwards you went off again with Dick Phelps,” he continued.

“Kenneth,” said Patty, looking at him with an expression of mock terror, “I couldn’t help myself that time! Honest, I couldn’t. Mr. Phelps is a fearful tyrant. He’s an ogre, and when he commanded me to go, I just had to go! He’s a man that makes you do a thing, whether you want to or not. Why, Kenneth, he just marched me off!”

“All right,” said Kenneth, “I’ll take a leaf out of his book. After this, when I want you to go anywhere, I’ll just march you off.”

“You can try,” said Patty, saucily, “but I’m not sure you can do it. It takes a certain type of man to do that sort of thing successfully, and I don’t know anybody but Dick Phelps who’s just that kind.”

But peace was restored, for Kenneth realised that Patty’s explanation was a fair one, and that he had been foolishly quick to take offence.

After supper they all went to the grand stand to see the parade of fancy costumes.

These were quite separate from the booth attendants, and a prize had been offered for the cleverest conceit, most successfully carried out.

When at last the grand march took place, it showed a wonderful array of thoroughly ingenious costumes.

Of course there were many clowns, historical characters, fairies, and queer nondescript creatures, but there were also many characters which were unique and noteworthy.

Mr. Hepworth, who was in the parade, had chosen to represent the full moon.

How he did it, no one quite knew; but all that was visible was an enormous sphere, of translucent brightness and a luminous yellow color.

Mr. Fairfield declared that the medium must be phosphorus, but all agreed that it was a wonderful achievement, and many thought it would surely take the prize.

The sphere was hollow, and made of a light framework, and Mr. Hepworth walked inside of it, really carrying it along with him. It so nearly touched the ground that his feet were scarcely observable, and the great six foot globe made a decided sensation, as it moved slowly along.

Patty remembered that Roger had declared he was going to take the prize, and as she had knowledge of the boy’s ability along these lines, she felt by no means sure that it wouldn’t eclipse Mr. Hepworth’s shining orb.

And sure enough, when Roger appeared, it was in the character of a Christmas tree!

The clever youth had selected just the right kind of a tree, and cutting away enough twigs and branches near the trunk on one side, he had made a space in which he could thrust the whole of his tall slender self.

To protect his face and hands from the scratchy foliage, and also to render himself inconspicuous, he wore a tight-fitting robe of dark brown muslin, which concealed even his face and arms, though eyeholes allowed him to see where he was going.

In a word, the boy himself almost constituted the trunk of the tree, and by walking slowly, it looked as if the tree itself was moving along without assistance.

The tree was gaily hung with real Christmas trinkets and decorations, and lighted with candles.

The idea was wonderfully clever, and though it had been hard work to arrange the boughs to conceal him entirely, Roger had accomplished it, and the gay decorations hid all defects.

The judges awarded the prize to Roger, who calmly remarked to Patty, afterward, “I told you I’d get it, didn’t I?”

“Yes,” said Patty, “and so then of course I knew you would.”

It was a rather tired party that went back to the Fairfields’ house at the close of the evening.

Nan and Mr. Fairfield issued strict orders that everybody must go to bed at once, as there were two more strenuous days ahead, and they needed all the rest they could get.

But next morning they reappeared, quite ready for fresh exertions, and Patty declared that for her part she’d like to be a gypsy all the year round.

“Well I never want to be a Christmas tree again,” said Roger, “in spite of my precautions, I’m all scratched up!”

“Never mind,” said his sister consolingly, “you took the prize, and that’s glory enough to make up for lots of scratches.”

The second and third days of the Fair were much like the first, except that the crowds of visitors continually increased.

The fame of the entertainment spread rapidly, and people came, even from distant parts of Long Island, to attend the festivities.

But at last it was all over, and the Fairfield verandah was crowded with young people, apparently of all nations, who were congratulating each other on the wonderful success.

“Of course,” said Patty, “the greatest thing was that we had such perfect weather. If it had rained, the whole thing would have been spoiled.”

“But it didn’t rain,” said Nan, “and everything went off all right, and they must have made bushels of money.”

“Well, it was lovely,” said Patty with a little sigh, “and I enjoyed every minute of it, but I don’t want to engage in another one right away. I think I shall go to bed and sleep for a week!”

“I wish I were a bear,” said Kenneth, “they can go to sleep and sleep all winter.”

“You’d make a good bear,” said Patty, in an aside to him, “because you can be so cross.”

But the merry smile that accompanied her words robbed them of any unpleasant intent, and Kenneth smiled back in sympathy.

“Just to think,” said Nan, “a week from to-day we’ll all be back in the city, and our lovely summer vacation a thing of the past.”

“It has been a beautiful summer,” said Patty, her thoughts flying backward over the past season. “I’ve never had such a happy summer in my life. It’s been just one round of pleasure after another. Everybody has been so good to me and the whole world seems to have connived to help me have a good time.”

“In so far as I’m part of the whole world, allow me to express my willingness to keep right on conniving,” said big Dick Phelps, in his funny way.

“Me, too,” said Kenneth, in his hearty, boyish voice.

Mr. Hepworth said nothing, but he smiled at Patty from where he sat at the other end of the long verandah.