Tish Plays the Game Read online

  But the fact is that Tish had outgrown the cottage life at Penzance, and we all knew it. Save for an occasional golf ball from the links breaking a window now and then, and the golfers themselves who brought extra shoes done up in paper for us to keep for them, paying Hannah something to put them on the ice, there was nothing to rouse or interest her.

  Her mind was as active as ever; it was her suggestion that a clothespin on Aggie’s nose might relieve the paroxysms of her hay fever, and she was still filled with sentiment. It was her own idea on the anniversary of Mr. Wiggins’ demise to paint the cottage roof a fresh and verdant green as a memorial to him, since he had been a master roofer by profession.

  But these had been the small and simple annals of her days. To all outward seeming, until the night of the treasure hunt, our Tish was no longer the Tish who with our feeble assistance had captured the enemy town of X— during the war, or held up the band of cutthroats on Thundercloud, or led us through the wilderness of the Far West. An aëroplane in the sky or the sound of the Smith boys racing along in their stripped flivver may have reminded her of brighter days, but she said nothing.

  Once, indeed, she had hired a horse from the local livery stable and taken a brief ride, but while making a short cut across the Cummings estate the animal overturned a beehive. Although Tish, with her customary presence of mind, at once headed the terrified creature for the swimming pool, where a number of persons were bathing and sunning themselves in scanty apparel about the edge, the insects forsook the beast the moment horse and rider plunged beneath the surface and a great many people were severely stung. Indeed, the consequences threatened to be serious, for Tish was unable to get the horse out again and it was later necessary to bring a derrick from Penzance to rescue him. But her protests over the enormous bills rendered by the livery man were feeble, indeed, compared to the old days.

  “Twenty dollars!” she said. “Are you claiming that that animal, which should have been able to jump over a beehive without upsetting it, was out ten hours?”

  “That’s my charge,” he said. “Walk, trot and canter is regular rates, but swimming is double, and cheap at that. The next time you want to go out riding, go to the fish pier and I reckon they’ll oblige you. You don’t need a horse, lady. What you want is a blooming porpoise.”

  Which, of course, is preposterous. There are no porpoises in Lake Penzance.

  She even made the blackberry cordial that year, a domestic task usually left to Aggie and myself, but I will say with excellent results. For just as it was ready for that slight fermentation which gives it its medicinal quality, a very pleasant young man came to see us, having for sale a fluid to be added to homemade cordials and so on, which greatly increased their bulk without weakening them.

  “But how can one dilute without weakening?” Tish demanded suspiciously.

  “I would not call it dilution, madam. It is really expansion.”

  It was a clear colorless liquid with a faintly aromatic odor, which he said was due to juniper in it, and he left us a small bottle for experimental purposes.

  With her customary caution, our dear Tish would not allow us to try it until it had been proved, and some days later Hannah reporting a tramp at the back door, she diluted—or rather expanded—a half glass of cordial, gave him some cookies with it, and we all waited breathlessly.

  It had no ill effect, however. The last we saw of the person he was quite cheery; and, indeed, we heard later that he went into Penzance, and getting one of the town policemen into an alley, forced him to change trousers with him. As a matter of record, whether it was Tish’s efforts with the cordial itself, or the addition of the expansion matter which we later purchased in bulk and added, I cannot say. But I do know that on one occasion, having run out of gasoline, we poured a bottle of our blackberry cordial into the tank of the motor boat and got home very nicely indeed. I believe that this use of fruit juices has not heretofore been generally known.

  Tish, I know, told it to Mr. Stubbs, the farmer who brought us our poultry, advising him to try cider in his car instead of feeding his apples to his hogs. But he only stared at her.

  “Feed apples to hogs these days!” he said. “Why, lady, my hogs ain’t seen an apple for four years! They don’t know there is such a thing.”

  Occupied with these small and homely duties then, we went on along the even tenor of our way through July and August, and even into September. In August, Charlie Sands sent us a radio, and thereafter it was our custom at 7:20 A.M. to carry our comforters into Tish’s bedroom and do divers exercises in loose undergarments.

  It is to this training that I lay Tish’s ability to go through the terrible evening which followed with nothing more serious than a crack in a floating rib.

  And in September Charlie Sands himself weekended with us, as I have said; with the result of a definite break in our monotony and a revival of Tish’s interest in life which has not yet begun to fade.

  Yet his visit itself was uneventful enough. It was not until Mrs. Ostermaier’s call on Saturday evening that anything began to develop. I remember the evening most distinctly. Our dear Tish was still in her dressing gown, after a very unpleasant incident of the morning, when she had inflated a pair of water wings and gone swimming. Unluckily, when some distance out she had endeavored to fasten the water wings with a safety pin to her bathing garments and the air at once began to escape. When Charlie Sands reached the spot only a few bubbles showed where our unfortunate Tish had been engulfed. She had swallowed a great deal of water, and he at once suggested bailing her out.

  “By and large,” he said, “I’ve been bailing you out for the last ten years. Why not now?”

  But she made no response save to say that she had swallowed a fish. “Get me a doctor,” she said thickly. “I can feel the thing wriggling.”

  “Doctor nothing!” he told her. “What you need is a fisherman, if that’s the case.”

  But she refused to listen to him, saying that if she was meant to be an aquarium she would be one; and seeing she was firm, he agreed.

  “Very well,” he said cheerfully. “But why not do the thing right while you’re about it? How about some pebbles and a tadpole or two?”

  The result of all this was that Tish, although later convinced there was no fish, was in an uncertain mood that evening as we sat about the radio. She had, I remember, got Chicago, where a lady at some hotel was singing By the Waters of Minnetonka. Turning away from Chicago, she then got Detroit, Michigan, and a woman there was singing the same thing.

  Somewhat impatiently, she next picked up Atlanta, Georgia, where a soprano was also singing it, and the same thing happened with Montreal, Canada. With a strained look, our dear Tish then turned to the national capital, and I shall never forget her expression when once more the strains of Minnetonka rang out on the evening air.

  With an impatient gesture, she shoved the box away from her, and the various batteries and so on fell to the floor. And at that moment Mrs. Ostermaier came in breathless, and said that she and Mr. Ostermaier had just got Denver, and heard it quite distinctly.

  “A woman was singing,” she said. “Really, Miss Carberry, we could hear every word. She was singing—”

  “The Waters of Minnetonka?” asked Tish.

  “Why, however did you guess it?”

  It was probably an accident, but as Tish got up suddenly, her elbow struck the box itself, and the box fell with a horrible crash. Tish never even looked at it, but picked up her knitting and fell to work on a bedroom slipper, leaving Mrs. Ostermaier free to broach her plan.

  For, as it turned out, she had come on an errand. She and Mr. Ostermaier wished to know if we could think of any way to raise money and put a radio in the state penitentiary, which was some miles away along the lake front.

  “Think,” she said, “of the terrible monotony of their lives there! Think of the effect of the sweetness disseminated by Silver Threads Among the Gold or By the Waters of—”

  “Mr. Wiggins a
lways said that music had power to soothe the savage beast,” Aggie put in hastily. “Have you thought of any plan?”

  “Mr. Ostermaier suggested that Miss Tish might think of something. She is so fertile.”

  But Tish’s reaction at first was unfavorable.

  “Why?” she said. “We’ve made our jails so pleasant now that there’s a crime wave so people can get into them.” But she added, “I’m in favor of putting one in every prison if they’d hire a woman to sing The Waters of Minnetonka all day and all night. If that wouldn’t stop this rush to the penitentiaries, nothing will.”

  On the other hand, Charlie Sands regarded the idea favorably. He sat sipping a glass of cordial and thinking, and at last said:

  “Why not? Think of an entire penitentiary doing the morning daily dozen! Or laying out bridge hands, according to radio instructions! Broaden ’em. Make ’em better citizens. Send ’em out fit to meet the world again. Darned good idea—Silver Threads Among the Gold for the burglars and Little Brown Jug for the bootleggers. Think of Still as the Night for the moonshiners, too, and the bedtime stories for the cradle snatchers. Why, it’s got all sorts of possibilities!”

  He then said to leave it to him and he would think up something; and falling to work on the radio, soon had it in operation again. His speech had evidently had a quieting effect on Tish, and when the beautiful strains of The Waters of Minnetonka rang out once more she merely placed her hands over her ears and said nothing.

  It was after his departure on Monday that he wrote us the following note, and succeeded in rousing our dear Tish:

  “Beloved Maiden Ladies: I have been considering the problem of the radio for our unfortunate convicts. How about a treasure hunt—à la Prince of Wales—to raise the necessary lucre? I’ll write the clews and bury a bag of pennies—each entrant to pay five dollars, and the profits to go to the cause.

  “Oil up the old car and get out the knickerbockers, for it’s going to be a tough job. And don’t forget, I’m betting on you. Read the Murders in the Rue Morgue for clews and deductive reasoning. And pass me the word when you’re ready. Devotedly, C.S.”

  “P.S. My usual terms are 20 per cent, but will take two bottles of cordial instead. Please mark ‘Preserves’ on box. C.”

  II

  WE SAW AN IMMEDIATE change in Tish from that moment. The very next morning we put on our bathing suits and, armed with soap and sponges, drove the car into the lake for a washing. Unluckily a wasp stung Tish on the bare knee as we advanced and she stepped on the gas with great violence, sending us out a considerable distance, and, indeed, rendering it necessary to crawl out and hold to the top to avoid drowning.

  Here we were marooned for some time, until Hannah spied us and rowed out to us. It was finally necessary to secure three horses and a long rope to retrieve the car, and it was some days in drying out.

  But aside from these minor matters, things went very well. Mr. Ostermaier, who was not to search, took charge of the hunt from our end and reported numerous entrants from among the summer colony, and to each entrant the following was issued:

  1. The cars of the treasure hunters will meet at the Rectory on Saturday evening at eight o’clock.

  2. Each hunter will receive a password or sentence, and a sealed envelope containing the first clew.

  3. This clew found, another password and fresh sealed envelope will be discovered. And so on.

  4. There are six clews.

  5. Participants are requested to use care in driving about the country, as the local police force has given notice that it will be stationed at various points to prevent reckless driving.

  6. After the treasure is discovered, the hunt will please meet at the Rectory, where light refreshments will be served. It is requested that if possible the search be over before midnight in order not to infringe on the Sabbath day.

  In view of the fact that certain persons, especially Mrs. Cummings—who should be the last to complain—have accused Tish of certain unethical acts during that terrible night, I wish to call attention to certain facts:

  (a) We obeyed the above rules to the letter, save possibly Number Five.

  (b) There was no actual identification of the scissors.

  (c) If there was a box of carpet tacks in our car, neither Aggie nor I saw them.

  (d) The fish pier had been notoriously rotten for years.

  (e) We have paid for the repairs to the motorcycle, and so on.

  (f) Doctor Parkinson is not permanently lamed, and we have replaced his lamps.

  (g) Personally, knowing Tish’s detestation of cross-word puzzles, I believe the false clews were a joke on the part of others concerned.

  (h) We did that night what the local police and the sheriff from Edgewater had entirely failed to do, and risked our lives in so doing. Most of the attack is purely jealousy of Letitia Carberry’s astute brain and dauntless physical courage.

  I need say no more. As Tish observed to Charlie Sands the next day, when he came to see her, lifting herself painfully in her bed;

  “I take no credit for following the clews; they were simplicity itself. And I shall pay all damages incurred. But who is to pay for this cracked rib and divers minor injuries, or replace poor Aggie’s teeth? Tell me that, and then get out and let me sleep. I’m an old woman.”

  “Old!” said Charlie Sands. “Old! If you want to see an aged and a broken man, look at me! I shall have to put on a false mustache to get out of town.”

  But to return to the treasure hunt.

  On the eventful day we worked hard. By arrangement with Mr. Stubbs, our poultry man, he exchanged the license plates from his truck for ours in the morning, and these we put on, it being Tish’s idea that in case our number was taken by the local motor policeman, Mr. Stubbs could prove that he was in bed and asleep at the time. We also took out our tail light, as Tish said that very probably the people who could not unravel their clews would follow us if possible, and late in the afternoon, our arrangements being completed, Tish herself retired to her chamber with a number of envelopes in her hand.

  Lest it be construed that she then arranged the cross-word puzzles which were later substituted for the real clews, I hasten to add that I believe, if I do not actually know, that she wrote letters concerning the missionary society at that time. She is an active member.

  At 5:30 we had an early supper and one glass of cordial each.

  “I think better on an empty stomach,” Tish said. “And I shall need my brains to-night.”

  “If that’s what you think of Aggie and myself, we’d better stay at home,” I said sharply.

  “I have not stated what I think of your brain, Lizzie, nor of Aggie’s either. Until I do, you have no reason for resentment.”

  Peace thus restored, we ate lightly of tea, toast and lettuce sandwiches; and having donned our knickerbockers and soft hats, were ready for the fray. Aggie carrying a small flask of cordial for emergencies and I a flashlight and an angel-food cake to be left at the Rectory, we started out on what was to prove one of the most eventful evenings in our experience.

  Tish was thoughtful on the way over, speaking occasionally of Poe and his system of deductive reasoning in solving clews, and also of Conan Doyle, but mostly remaining silent.

  Aggie, however, was sneezing badly, due to the dust, and this annoying Tish, she stopped where some washing was hanging out and sent her in for a clothespin. She procured the pin, but was discovered and chased, and undoubtedly this is what led later to the story that the bandits—of whom more later—had, before proceeding to the real business of the night, attempted to steal the Whitings’ washing.

  But the incident had made Aggie very nervous and she took a second small dose of the cordial. Of this also more later on.

  There was a large group of cars in front of the Rectory. The Smith boys had brought their flivver, stripped of everything but the engine and one seat for lightness, and the Cumminges, who are very wealthy, had brought their racer. Tish eyed them both with a
certain grimness.

  “Not speed, but brains will count, Lizzie,” she said to me. “What does it matter how fast they can go if they don’t know where they’re going?”

  After some thought, however, she took off the engine hood and the spare tire and laid them aside, and stood gazing at Aggie, now fast asleep in the rear seat.

  “I could leave her too,” she said. “She will be of no help whatever. But on the other hand, she helps to hold the rear springs down when passing over bumps.”

  Mrs. Ostermaier then passed around glasses of lemonade, saying that every hunt drank a stirrup cup before it started, and Mr. Ostermaier gave us our envelopes and the first password, which was “Ichthyosaurus.”

  It was some time before everyone had memorized it, and Tish utilized the moments to open her envelope and study the clew. The password, as she said, was easy; merely a prehistoric animal. The clew was longer:

  “Water, water, everywhere, nor any drop to drink.

  Two twos are four, though some say more, and i-n-k spells ink.”

  “Water?” I said. “That must be somewhere by the lake, Tish.”

  “Nonsense! What’s to prevent your drinking the lake dry if you want to? I-n-k! It may be the stationer’s shop; but if it ever saw water, I don’t believe it. ‘Two twos are four, though some say more!’ Well, if they do, they’re fools, and so is Charlie Sands for writing such gibberish.”

  What made matters worse was that the Smith boys were already starting off laughing, and two or three other people were getting ready to move. Suddenly Tish set her mouth and got into the car, and it was as much as I could do to crawl in before she had cut straight through the canna bed and out onto the road.

  The Smith boys were well ahead, but we could still see their tail light, and we turned after them. Tish held the wheel tightly, and as we flew along she repeated the clew, which with her wonderful memory she had already learned by heart. But no light came to either of us, and at the crossroads we lost the Smith boys and were obliged to come to a stop. This we did rather suddenly, and Mr. Gilbert, who is a vestryman in our church, bumped into us and swore in a most unbefitting manner.