CHAPTER VI

       Table of Contents

      The pleasant aromas of coffee and sausages were mingling in the air when “Guardy Lud” woke up and looked about the old-fashioned room with a sense of satisfaction. The very pictures on the walls rested him, they reminded him so much of the rooms in his boyhood home. He had a feeling that old-fashioned things were best, and in spite of the fact that he owned a house most different from this one himself and knew that his wife would not for a minute have tolerated any old-fashioned things about unless they were so old-fashioned that they had become the latest rage, he could not help feeling that a woman brought up amid such simple surroundings would be the very best kind to mother these orphan children who had been left on his helpless hands. He would have loved to take them to his heart and his home; but his wife was not so minded, and that ended it. But it rolled a great burden from his shoulders to feel that he might leave them in such capable hands.

      They had a rollicking time at breakfast, for Guardy Lud was delighted with the crisp brown sausages, fried potatoes, and buckwheats with real maple-syrup; and he laughed, and ate, and told stories with the children, and kept the old dining-room walls ringing with joy as they had not resounded within the memory of Julia Cloud. Then suddenly the door opened, and there stood Ellen Robinson, disapproval and hauteur written in every line of her unpleasant face! One could hardly imagine how those two, Julia and Ellen, could possibly be sisters.

      Dismay filled Julia Cloud’s heart for an instant, and brought a pallor to her cheek. How had she forgotten Ellen? What a fool she had been to tell Ellen to come early in the morning! But she had not realized that Mr. Luddington would be willing to come out to her humble home and stay all night. She had supposed that the arrangements would be made in the city. However, it could not be helped now; and a glance at the kind, strong face of the white-haired man gave her courage. Ellen could not really spoil their plans with him there. He felt that the arrangement was good, and with him to back her she felt she could stand out against any arguments her sister might bring forth.

      So she rose with a natural ease, and introduced her. “My sister Mrs. Robinson, Mr. Luddington”; and Ellen stiffly and still disapprovingly acknowledged the introduction.

      “I won’t interrupt,” she said disagreeably. “I’m just going up to look over some of my mother’s things.” And she turned to the back stairway, and went up, closing the door behind her.

      Mr. Luddington gazed after her a second; and then, taking his glasses off and wiping them energetically, he remarked:

      “Well, well, bless my soul! It must be getting late! We’ve had such a good time I didn’t realize. Those certainly were good buckwheats, Miss Cloud. I shan’t forget them very soon. And now I suppose we’d better get down to business. Could we just go into the other room there, and close the door for a few minutes, not to be interrupted?” and he cast an anxious glance toward the stair-door again.

      Julia Cloud smiled understandingly, and ushered them into the little parlor ablaze with fall sunshine, its windows wreathed about with crimsoning woodbine; and, as she caught the glow and glint from the window, she remembered the gray evening when she had looked out across into her future as she supposed it would be. How beautiful and wonderful that the gray had changed to glow! As she sat down to enter into the contract that was to bind her to a new and wonderful life with great responsibilities and large possibilities, her heart, accustomed to look upward, sent a whisper of thanksgiving heavenward.

      The details did not take long, after all; for Mr. Luddington was a keen business man, and he had gone over the whole proposition, and had the plan in writing for her to sign, telling just what were her duties and responsibilities with regard to his wards, just how much money she would have for housekeeping and servants and other expenses, and the salary she would receive herself for accepting this care.

      “You’re practically in a position of mother to them, you know,” he said, beaming at her genially; “and I declare I never laid eyes on a woman that I thought could fill the part better!”

      Julia Cloud was quite overwhelmed. But the matter of the salary troubled her.

      “I think it should not be a matter of money,” she demurred. “I would rather do it for love, you know.”

      “Love’s all right!” said the old man, smiling; “but this thing has got to be on a business basis, or the terms of the will will not allow me to agree to it. You see what you are going to undertake means work, and it means sticking to it; and you deserve pay for it, and we’re not going to accept several of the best years out of your life for nothing. Besides, you’ve got to feel free to give up the job if it proves too burdensome for you.”

      “And you to dismiss me if I do not prove capable for the position,” suggested Julia Cloud, lifting meek and honest eyes to meet his gaze.

      “Well, well, well, I can see there won’t be any need of that!” sputtered the old gentleman pleasantly. “But, however that is, this is the contract I’ve made out. And I’m quite satisfied. So are the children. Are you willing to sign it? Of course there’s a clause in there about reasonable notice if there is dissatisfaction on either side; that lets you out at any time you get tired of it. Only give me a chance to look after these youngsters properly.”

      Julia Cloud took the pen eagerly, tremblingly, a sense of wonder in her pounding heart, and signed her name just as Ellen’s heavy footsteps could be heard pounding down the back stairs. Leslie seized Julia, and gave her a great hug as the last letter was finished, and then threw open the parlor door in the nick of time to save her Aunt Ellen from seeming to be deserted.

      Ellen Robinson appeared on the scene just in time to witness the hearty hand-shake that Guardy Lud gave Julia Cloud as he picked up the papers and went up-stairs for his suitcase while Allison went after the car to take him to the train.

      “Is that man married? Because, if he isn’t, I don’t think it’s respectable for you to go and live near him!” declared Ellen in a penetrating voice to the intense distress of Julia Cloud, who was happily hurrying the dishes from the breakfast table.

      But Leslie came to the rescue.

      “Oh, indeed, Aunt Ellen, he’s very much married! Altogether too much married for comfort. He would be a dear if it wasn’t for his silly little old bossy wife! But he doesn’t intend to live anywhere near us. His home is off in California, and he’s going back next week. He’s only waiting to see us settled somewhere before he goes back; so you needn’t worry about Aunt Jewel’s morals. We’ll take good care of her. But isn’t he a dear? He was my Grandfather Leslie’s best friend.”

      Leslie chattered on gayly till the visitor’s footsteps could be heard coming down-stairs again, and Ellen Robinson could only shut her lips tight and go into the kitchen, from which her sister beat immediately a hasty retreat lest more unpleasant remarks should be forthcoming.

      Julia Cloud bade Mr. Luddington good-by, standing on her own front steps, and then waited a moment, looking off toward the hills which had shut in her vision all her life. The two young people had rushed down to the car, and were pulling their guardian joyously inside. They seemed to do everything joyously,