CHAPTER II AN INCIDENTAL EXPLOSION

Even the most difficult tasks are finally accomplished, and now Nancy was actually riding towards Boston. The details of closing up their little home had been rather confusing, especially as each member of the small family was starting out in a different direction, but it was all done at last, and soon Nancy would cross Boston and take the Maine line out toward New Hampshire.

It seemed so unnecessary for any one to meet her at the South Station and taxi with her over to the North Station, but there was Miss Newton, a friend who had visited the Brandons and who lived almost in Boston. With her, Nancy’s mother had arranged, both for crossing the big city and having lunch, so that there could be no possible danger in her daughter’s journey. Also, after lunch in the15 upstairs station restaurant, Miss Newton, a lively young woman who seemed just like a girl to Nancy, insisted upon making up a little box of fruit for the train journey.

“Never can tell about these long afternoon rides,” said Miss Newton, when she bought five more blue plums. “They may side-track you and you’ll be glad to have a fruity supper along with you.”

Nancy expressed her gratitude, of course, and as the Boston and Maine afternoon train steamed out, she didn’t feel quite so lonely without her mother, because of Miss Newton’s jolly waving and pleasant little send-off.

The train was crowded. Many mothers and children seemed to have been on shopping tours. Naturally Nancy was concerned with the prospect before her, for since Rosalind’s letters were so effusively pre-welcoming and so hysterically anxious about what she termed, “the troubles and trials at Fernlode,” Nancy could form no opinion of the strange household. She knew she was going to be shy of that important new, stylish, beautiful Aunt16 Betty, for the reputation she had obtained was enough to strike awe into the heart of any girl visitor. Of Uncle Frederic she knew positively that she just loved him, for he had visited her own home late last fall, and he was “a king” as Ted expressed it. Rosalind had been away at boarding school all the time, it seemed to Nancy, so the young cousins had never met, for even Rosalind’s vacations had been usually spent abroad. This year, however, she had insisted upon remaining at home, although her father and step-mother were to sail shortly.

But now Nancy’s train sped on, and the flying landscape, though novel after the big factories and the bridges were passed, held small interest for the young summer tourist. She noticed that a woman with two small boys had bought those silly little boxes of ice-cream with the foolish tin spoons, and their delight in lapping up the stuff was rather amusing. It was funny, too, to see the people spill water cups along the aisle, and when a very stout man dozed off, and let his bald17 head tap a lady on her bead-bedecked shoulder, Nancy indulged in an audible titter while the ice-cream boys shouted loud enough to wake up the indecorous gentleman.

Such trifling incidents helped to while away the time, and after the big mill dam was passed, which according to the timetable indicated the state line of Massachusetts and New Hampshire, with somehow touching on a corner of Maine, then Nancy knew the journey was almost over.

The afternoon was cool and pleasant, for early June was still behaving beautifully, and Nancy was not sorry that she had taken her mother’s advice and worn her school suit of blue serge.

“I suppose,” she ruminated, “Rosalind’s clothes will be gor-gee-ous.” This visioned her own limited outfit. “But being so fat it must be hard getting clothes. They all have to be made to order, of course.”

It was at this juncture that the little old-fashioned woman, in the seat opposite Nancy, spread her ginghamed self out in the aisle, in18 order to cope more freely with the over-crowded bag she was struggling to close. Her efforts were so violent, and her groans so audible, that everybody around took frank notice of her. First, she would get between the two seats, backing to that in front, and trudge away at the helpless, hopeless carry-all. Then, she would put the bag on the floor and work from the aisle. Finally, she literally threw up her hands and looked comically at Nancy.

“Ain’t it the mischief, sissy?” she said suddenly. “I got to get off with that bag bulged wide open.”

Nancy laughed outright. “Sissy” was such an old-fashioned name to be called. Then she looked critically at the recalcitrant bag.

“Maybe I could do it,” she suggested, although she instinctively felt like calling the car man to help. Yet the funny little country woman, with her checked gingham dress, her bronzed skin and her perfectly useless hat, that merely rested on the top of her frowsy head, was smiling so friendly, that Nancy felt19 impelled to offer personal aid.

So she stepped over and tackled the bag. It was too full, much too full, of course, and the articles in it were the non-crushable kind, hard and firm. Surely the biggest opponent to the catch and its clasp meeting was a bottle, for it bulged out in one place as fast as Nancy tried to push it in at another.

“I’m afraid I can’t close it,” Nancy admitted reluctantly. “Couldn’t you take anything out?”

The woman pulled her face into such funny crinkles, it looked as if she was winking all over it. Then she made queer noises, but they could not be called words, and at last a man who had been watching the performance, over his reading glasses, dropped his paper and silently offered his services.

He was a very dignified gentleman, and he readily acknowledged Nancy’s presence, although he did not directly address her. The little woman was being regarded as very much out of order, and truth to tell she was very generally disturbing the peace in that end of20 the car.

But now the man, with his strong hands and white shirt-cuffs, undertook to conquer the rebel bag. He would plainly have no nonsense, would make short work of it, for his face was set with a look of active determination.

Once, twice, he tried to snap it shut. Then—there was something like an explosion!

Splash! A perfect fountain of red liquid shot straight up in the air!

“Oh, mercy!” yelled the owner of the bag. “There goes Martha’s grape juice!”

And go it did, apparently as far and farther than even good home-made grape juice is supposed to travel, for it covered the face and shirt front of the determined man, it all but shampooed the blonde head in the next seat front, it managed, somehow, to include Nancy in its area, for across the aisle shot a thin but virulent little stream, and while one party was trying to dodge it another would fall into its furious path.

“A bomb! A bomb!” yelled one of the ice21 cream boys joyfully.

“Maybe it’s a bandit’s hold-up,” yelped the other boy, hopefully.

“It’s my lovely grape juice and it’s working—” moaned the woman in the gingham dress. But what she meant by “working” was not what the spectators were thinking of. She meant effervescing, while they simply saw liquid fireworks shooting around the car.

It was all over in a few moments, but the well intentioned man could not erase the stains from his expansive shirt front—it was hard enough to get the grape juice out of his eyes.

The blonde woman, whose bobbed head had been caught in the shower, seemed the one most injured, and she took no trouble to restrain her indignation!

“The idea! Carrying that stuff around!” she argued. “Just imagine! Black and blue grape juice,” and she swabbed her head frantically with all the handkerchiefs she could resurrect from pockets and hand bags. Blonde hair dyed wine color did look odd.

22 “I’m awfully sorry,” the gingham woman admitted. “It was just a present from my cousin Martha—”

“Then, why didn’t you hire a truck instead of buying a railway ticket,” fired back the crimson-spotted blonde. “Seems to me—” But her further arguments were lost in the sudden stopping of the train and the hurried getting off of the unfortunate grape juice owner.

She made opportunity for a smile to Nancy, however, as she edged her way out, and as she left the train it was the boy who had shouted “bomb” at the accident who pegged her the cork of that bottle. Strange to say, the woman caught the stopper, and bravely took the almost empty bottle from the rebellious bag, banged the cork in firmly, and was then on her way—with the bottle in one hand and the famous bag in the other.

Everyone’s face seemed to betray amusement, for during the entire episode the little woman had shown real good nature. First, she was patient, as well as determined, in attempting23 to close the obstreperous bag; next, when the mighty all-knowing man went to her assistance and caused the grape juice explosion, she only smiled and herself took the blame for his mistake.

All of this wavered in Nancy’s mind, and with it came one of those unaccountable little flickering thoughts, unbidden and unreasonable. It suggested a future meeting of Nancy and the gingham woman.

“But wherever would I and why ever should I meet her again?” Nancy deliberated. “She’s probably just some farmer lady, and this station is miles from Craggy Bluff.”

The incident served admirably to brighten the last hour of her journey, and even the wonderful capers of a late afternoon sun, gyrating over the New England hills, failed to hold interest now, as a long train trip wound up the miles, like a boy’s fish line after a long waiting and a poor catch.

Nancy’s bag and hat box were made hold of even before the trainman called out the station, and now that she had actually arrived24 at Rosalind’s summer place, Nancy caught her breath, apprehensively.

“With mother in Europe and Manny far off, I’ll have to like it,” she reflected, “but then, why shouldn’t I?” Her question poised itself boldly before her, for somehow even the lure of luxury was not altogether reassuring.

It was now almost seven o’clock, and the young tourist noticed no one preparing to leave the train at the approaching station. True, there were so few passengers left, there might be individual stations for each one of them; but Craggy Bluff was sure to be exclusive.

The very word as she thought of it, rather terrified Nancy, for, after all, she enjoyed folks, loved companionship and appreciated girlhood’s privileges.

“But Rosalind and—Orilla,” she was forced to reflect, “they will be good company—I hope.” It was Orilla’s personality that puzzled her, for the accounts of that queer girl had been anything but flattering.

“Craggy Bluff!” called out the trainman,25 who promptly approached Nancy and took up her bag. This had been arranged for by the thoughtful Miss Newton, when the train was leaving Boston, so that there was no danger of Nancy mistaking her destination, or being inconvenienced by her baggage.

She stepped from the train, thanked the trainman and took her bag, just as a smiling girl ran up to her.

It was Rosalind! Fat and rosy, jolly and rollicking.

“Nancy!” she cried happily.

“Rosalind!” responded the traveller.

“Oh, how ducky! I just couldn’t wait. Over here. Chet!” called Rosalind to the chauffeur, who promptly hurried along for the bags. Rosalind continued to puff and putter. “Nancy! Isn’t it too darling to have you come?” Her arm was wound around Nancy’s waist. “Do you like the woods? And the water? And the hills? We even have wild beasts out here, but I never have hunted alone. Here’s our car. Jump right in. Chet, I must call at the post office.” Thus rattled26 on the exuberant Rosalind, as Nancy formed her first pleasant opinion of the important cousin.

Following these preliminaries, Nancy did manage to say a few words. But they didn’t mean anything, much, other than being pleasant words happily spoken.

The cousins were at last becoming acquainted, and while Nancy knew she was sure to love the impulsive Rosalind, Rosalind felt she was simply “dead in love” with Nancy, all of which favored the hopeful summertime ahead.