CHAPTER I

THE QUICK SHUNT FOR PUFFY

I must say I didn't get much excited at first over this Marion Gray

tragedy. You see, I'd just blown in from Cleveland, where I'd been

shunted by the Ordnance Department to report on a new motor kitchen. And

after spendin' ten days soppin' up information about a machine that was

a cross between a road roller and an owl lunch wagon, and fillin' my

system with army stews cooked on the fly, I'm suddenly called off.

Someone at Washington had discovered that this flying cook-stove thing

was a problem for the Quartermaster's Department, and wires me to drop

it.

So I was all for enjoyin' a little fam'ly reunion, havin' Vee tell me

how she's been gettin' along, and what cute little tricks young Master

Richard had developed while I'm gone. But right in the midst of our

intimate little domestic sketch Vee has to break loose with this outside

sigh stuff.

"I can't help thinking about poor Marion," says she.

"Eh?" says I, lookin' up from the crib where young Snookums has just

settled himself comfortable and decided to tear off a few more hours of

slumber. "Which Marion?"

"Why, Marion Gray," says she.

"Oh!" says I. "The old maid with the patient eyes and the sad smile?"

"She is barely thirty," says Vee.

"Maybe," says I; "but she's takin' it hard."

"Who wouldn't?" says Vee.

And havin' got that far, I saw I might as well let her get the whole

story off her chest. She's been seein' more and more of this Marion Gray

person ever since we moved out here to Harbor Hills. Kind of a plump,

fresh-colored party, and more or less bright and entertainin' in her

chat when she was in the right mood. I'd often come in and found Vee

chucklin' merry over some of the things Miss Gray had been tellin' her.

And while she was at our house she seemed full of life and pep. Just the

sort that Vee gets along with best. She was the same whenever we met her

up at the Ellinses. But outside of that you never saw her anywhere. She

wasn't in with the Country Club set, and most of the young married crowd

seemed to pass her up too.

I didn't know why. Guess I hadn't thought much about it. I knew she'd

lost her father and mother within the last year or so, so I expect I put

it down to that as the reason she wasn't mixin' much.

But Vee has all the inside dope. Seems old man Gray had been a chronic

invalid for years. Heart trouble. And durin' all the last of it he'd

been promisin' to check out constant, but had kept puttin' it off.

Meanwhile Mrs. Gray and Marion had been fillin' in as day and night

nurses. He'd been a peevish, grouchy old boy, too, and the more waitin'

on he got the more he demanded. Little things. He had to have his food

cooked just so, the chair cushions adjusted, the light just right. He

had to be read to so many hours a day, and played to, and sung to. He

couldn't stand it to be alone, not for half an hour. Didn't want to

think, he said. Didn't want to see the women folks knittin' or

crocheting: he wanted 'em to be attending to him all the while. He had a

little silver bell that he kept hung on his chair arm, and when he rang

it one or the other of 'em had to jump. Maybe you know the kind.

Course, the Grays traveled a lot; South in the winter, North in

summer--always huntin' a place where he'd feel better, and never findin'

it. If he was at the seashore he'd complain that they ought to be in the

mountains, and when they got there it wouldn't be a week before he had

decided the air was bad for him. They should have known better than to

take him there. Most likely one more week would finish him. Another long

railroad trip would anyway. So he might as well stay. But wouldn't

Marion see the landlord and have those fiendish children kept quiet on

that tennis court outside? And wouldn't Mother try to make an eggnog

that didn't taste like a liquid pancake!

Havin' been humorin' his whims a good deal longer than Marion, and not

being very strong herself, Mrs. Gray finally wore out. And almost before

they knew anything serious was the matter she was gone. Then it all fell

on Marion. Course, if she'd been a paid nurse she never would have stood

for this continuous double-time act. Or if there was home inspectors,

same as there are for factories, the old man would have been jacked up

for violatin' the labor laws. But being only a daughter, there's nobody

to step in and remind him that slavery has gone out of style and that in

most states the female of the species was gettin' to be a reg'lar

person. In fact, there was few who thought Marion was doin' any more'n

she had a right to do. Wasn't he her father, and wasn't he payin' all

the bills?

"To be sure," adds Vee, "he didn't realize what an old tyrant he was.

Nor did Marion. She considered it her duty, and never complained."

"Then I don't see who could have crashed in," said I.

"No one could," said Vee. "That was the pity."

And it seems for the last couple of years the old boy insisted on

settlin' down in his home here, where he could shuffle off comfortable.

He'd been mighty slow about it, though, and when he finally headed West

it was discovered that, through poor managin' and war conditions, the

income they'd been livin' on had shrunk considerable. The fine old house

was left free and clear, but there was hardly enough to keep it up

unless Marion could rustle a job somewhere.

"And all she knows how to do is nurse," says Vee. "She's not even a

trained nurse at that."

"Ain't there anybody she could marry?" I suggests.

"That's the tragic part, Torchy," says Vee. "There is--Mr. Biggies."

"What, 'Puffy' Biggles!" says I. "Not that old prune face with the shiny

dome and the baggy eyes?"

Vee says he's the one. He's been hoverin' 'round, like an old buzzard,

for three or four years now, playin' chess with the old man while he

lasted, but always with his pop-eyes fixed on Marion. And since she's

been left alone he'd been callin' reg'lar once a week, urging her to be

his tootsy-wootsy No. 3. He was the main wheeze in some third-rate life

insurance concern, I believe, and fairly well off, and he owned a classy

place over near the Country Club. But he had a 44 belt, a chin like a

pelican, and he was so short of breath that everybody called him

"Puffy" Biggles. Besides, he was fifty.

"A hot old Romeo he'd make for a nice girl like that," says I. "Is he

her best bet? Ain't there any second choice?"

"There was another," says Vee. "Rather a nice chap, too--that Mr. Ellery

Prescott, who played the organ so well and was some kind of a broker.

You remember?"

"Sure!" says I. "The one who pulled down a captain's commission at

Plattsburg. Did she have him on the string?"

"They had been friends for a long time," says Vee. "Were as good as

engaged once; though how he managed to see much of Marion I can't

imagine, with Mr. Gray so crusty toward him. You see, he didn't play

chess. Anyway, he finally gave up. I suppose he's at the front now, and

even if he ever should come back---- Well, Marion seldom mentions him.

I'm sure, though, that they thought a good deal of each other. Poor

thing! She was crazy to go across as a canteen worker. And now she

doesn't know what to do. Of course, there's always Biggles. If we could

only save her from that!"

At which remark I grows skittish. I didn't like the way she was gazin'

at me. "Ah, come, Vee!" says I. "Lay off that rescue stuff. Adoptin'

female orphans of over thirty, or matin' 'em up appropriate is way out

of my line. Suppose we pass resolutions of regret in Marion's case, and

let it ride at that?"

"At least," goes on Vee, "we can do a little something to cheer her up.

Mrs. Robert Ellins has asked her for dinner tomorrow night. Us too."

"Oh, I'll go that far," says I, "although the last I knew about the

Ellinses' kitchen squad, it's takin' a chance."

I was some little prophet, too. I expect Mrs. Robert hadn't been havin'

much worse a time with her help than most folks, but three cooks inside

of ten days was goin' some. Lots of people had been longer'n that

without any, though. But when any pot wrestler can step into a munition

works or an airplane factory and pull down her three or four dollars a

day for an eight-hour shift, what can you expect?

Answer: What we got that night at the Ellinses'. The soup had been

scorched once, but it had been cooled off nicely before it got to us.

The fish had been warmed through--barely. And the roast lamb tasted like

it had been put through an embalmin' process. But the cookin' was high

art compared to the service, for since their butler had quit to become a

crack riveter in a shipyard they've been havin' maids do their plate

jugglin'.

And this wide-built fairy, with the eyes that didn't track, sure was

constructed for anything but glidin' graceful around a dinner table.

For one thing, she had the broken-arch roll in her gait, and when she

pads in through the swing-door she's just as easy in her motion as a cow

walkin' the quarter-deck with a heavy sea runnin'. Every now and then

she'd scuff her toe in the rug, and how some of us escaped a soup or a

gravy bath I can't figure out. Maybe we were in luck.

Also, she don't mind reachin' in front of you and sidewipin' your ear

with her elbow. Accidents like that were merry little jokes to her.

"Ox-cuse me, Mister!" she'd pipe out shrill and childish, and then

indulged in a maniac giggle that would get Mrs. Robert grippin' the

chair arms.

She liked to be chatty and folksy while she was servin', too. Her motto

seemed to be, "Eat hearty and give the house a good name." If you

didn't, she tried to coax you into it, or it into you.

"Oh, do have some more of th' meat, Miss," she says to Vee. "And another

potato, now. Just one more, Miss."

And all Mrs. Robert can do is pink up, and when she's out of hearin'

apologize for her. "As you see," says Mrs. Robert, "she is hardly a

trained waitress."

"She'd make a swell auctioneer, though," I suggests.

"No doubt," says Mrs. Robert. "And I suppose I am fortunate enough to

have anyone in the kitchen at all, even to do the cooking--such as it

is."

"You ain't lonesome in feelin' that way," says I. "It seems to be a

general complaint."

Which brings out harrowin' tales of war-wrecked homes, where no buttling

had been done for months, where chauffeurs and gardeners were only

represented by stars on the service flag, and from which even personal

maids had gone to be stenographers and nurses. But chiefly it was the

missin' cook who was mourned. Some had quit to follow their men to

trainin' camps, a lot had copped out better payin' jobs, and others had

been lured to town, where they could get the fake war extras hot off the

press and earn higher wages as well.

Course, there were some substitute cooks--reformed laundresses, raw

amateurs and back numbers that should have reached the age limit long

before. And pretty awful cookin' they were gettin' away with. Vee had

heard of one who boiled the lettuce and sent in dog biscuit one mornin'

for breakfast cereal. Miss Gray told what happened at the Pemberton

Brookses when their kitchen queen had left for Bridgeport, where she had

a hubby makin' seventy-five dollars a week. The Brookses had lived for

three days on cream toast and sardines, which was all the upstairs girl

had in her culinary repertoire.

"And look at me," added Marion, "with our old family cook, who can make

the best things in the world, and I can hardly afford to keep her! But I

couldn't drive her away if I tried."

Course, with our havin' Professor and Madame Battou, the old French

couple we'd annexed over a year ago in town, we had no kick comin'. Not

even the sugar and flour shortage seemed to trouble them, and our fancy

meals continued regular as clock work. But on the way home Vee and I got

to talkin' about what hard times the neighbors was havin'.

"I guess what they need out here," says I, "is one of them army

kitchens, that would roll around two or three times a day deliverin' hot

nourishment from door to door."

And I'd hardly finished what I'd meant for a playful little remark

before Vee stops sudden, right in the middle of the road, and lets out

an excited squeal.

"Torchy!" says she. "Why on earth didn't you suggest that before!"

"Because this foolish streak has just hit me," says I.

"But it's the very thing," says she, clappin' her hands.

"Eh?" says I, gawpin'.

"For Marion," says she. "Don't you see?"

"But she's no perambulatin' rotisserie, is she?" says I.

"She might be," says Vee. "And she shall."

"Oh, very well," says I. "If you've decided it that way, I expect she

will. But I don't quite get you."

When Vee first connects with one of her bright ideas, though, she's apt

to be a little puzzlin' in her remarks about it. As a matter of fact,

her scheme is a bit hazy, but she's sure it's a winner.

"Listen, Torchy," says she. "Here are all these Harbor Hills

people--perhaps a hundred families--many of them with poor cooks, some

with none at all. And there is Marion with that perfectly splendid old

Martha of hers, who could cook for all of them."

"Oh, I see," says I. "Marion hangs out a table-board sign?"

"Stupid!" says Vee. "She does nothing of the sort. People don't want to

go out for their meals; they want to eat at home. Well, Marion brings

them their meals, all deliciously cooked, all hot, and ready to serve."

"With the kitchen range loaded on a truck and Martha passin' out soup

and roasts over the tailboard, eh?" says I.

But once more I've missed. No, the plan is to get a lot of them army

containers, such as they send hot chow up to the front trenches in; have

'em filled by Martha at home, and delivered by Marion to her customers.

"It might work," says I. "It would need some capital, though. She'd have

to invest in a lot of containers, and she'd need a motor truck."

"I will buy those," says Vee. "I'm going in with her."

"Oh, come!" says I. "You'd look nice, wouldn't you!"

"You mean that people would talk?" comes back Vee. "What do I care? It's

quite as patriotic and quite as necessary as Red Cross work, or anything

else. It would be scientific food conservation, man-power saving, all

that sort of thing. And think what a wonderful thing it would be for the

neighborhood."

"Maybe Marion wouldn't see it that way," I suggests. "Drivin' a dinner

truck around might not appeal to her. You got to remember she's more or

less of an old maid. She might have notions."

"Trust her," says Vee. "But I mean to have my plan all worked out before

I tell her a word. When you go to town tomorrow, Torchy, I want you to

find out all about those containers--how much the various compartments

will hold, and how much they cost. Also about a light motor truck. There

will be other details, too, which I will be thinking about."

Yes, there were other details. Nobody seemed to know much about such a

business. It had been tried in places. Vee heard of something of the

sort that was being tested up on the East Side. So it was three or four

days before she was ready to spring this new career on Marion. But one

night, after dinner, she announces that she's all set and drags me down

there with her. Outside of the old Gray house we finds a limousine, with

the driver dozin' inside.

"It's the Biggles car!" whispers Vee. "Oh, what if he should be----

Come, Torchy! Quick!"

"You wouldn't break in on a fond clinch, would you?" I asks.

"If it came to that, certainly," says Vee, pushin' the front-door button

determined.

I expect she would have, too. But Biggles hadn't got that far--not

quite. He's on the mat all right, though, with his fat face sort of

flushed and his eyes popped more'n usual. And Marion Gray seems to be

sort of fussed, too. She is some tinted up under the eyes, and when she

sees who it is she glances at Vee sort of appealin'.

"Oh, I'm so sorry to interrupt," says Vee, marchin' right in and takin'

Marion by the arm. "You'll pardon me, I hope, Mr. Biggles, but I must

speak to Miss Gray at once about--about something very important."

And almost before "Puffy" Biggles knows what's happened he's left

staring at an empty armchair.

In the cozy little library Vee pushes Marion down on a window seat and

camps beside her. Trust Vee for jabbin,' the probe right in, too.

"Tell me," she demands whispery, "was--was he at it again?"

Marion pinks up more'n ever. And, say, with them shy brown eyes of hers,

and all the curves, she ain't so hard to look at. "Yes," admits Marion.

"You see, I had promised to give him a final answer tonight."

"But surely, Marion," says Vee, "you'd never in the world tell him that

you----"

"I don't know," breaks in Marion, her voice trembly. "There seems to be

nothing else."

"Isn't there, though!" says Vee. "Just you wait until you hear."

And with that she plunges into a rapid outline sketch of this dinner

dispensary stunt, quotin' facts and figures and givin' a profit estimate

that sounded more or less generous to me.

"So you see," she goes on enthusiastic, "you could keep your home, and

you could keep Martha, and you would be doing something perfectly

splendid for the whole community. Besides, you would be entirely

independent of--of everyone."

"But do you think I could do it?" asks Marion.

"I know you could," says Vee. "Anyway, we could between us. I will

furnish the capital, and keep the accounts and help you plan the daily

menus. You will do the marketing and delivering. Martha will do the

cooking. And there you are! We may have to start with only a few family

orders at first, but others will come in fast. You'll see."

By that time Marion was catching the fever. Her eyes brighten and her

chin comes up.

"I believe we could do it," says she.

"And you're willing to try?" asks Vee.

Marion nods.

"Then," says Vee, "Mr. Biggles ought to be told that he needn't wait

around any longer."

"Oh, I don't see how I can," wails Marion. "He--he's such a----"

"A sticker, eh? I know," says Vee. "And it's a shame that he should have

another chance to bother you. Torchy, don't you suppose you could do it

for her?"

"What?" says I. "Break it to Biggles? Why, I could do it swell. Leave it

to me. I'll shunt him on the siding so quick he won't know he's ever

been on the main track."

I don't waste any diplomatic language doin' it, either. On my way in

where he's waiting I passes through the hall and gathers up his new

derby and yellow gloves, holdin' 'em behind me as I breaks in on him.

"Excuse me, Mr. Biggles," says I, "but it's all off."

"I--I beg pardon?" says he, gazin' at me fish-eyed and stupid.

"Ah, let's not run around in circles," says I. "Miss Gray presents her

compliments, and all that sort of stuff, but she's goin' into another

line. If you must know, she's going to bust up the cook combine, and

from now on she'll be mighty busy. Get me?"

Biggles stiffens and stares at me haughty. "I don't in the least

understand anything of all this," says he. "I had an appointment with

Marion for this evening; something quite important to--to us both. I may

as well tell you that I had asked Marion a momentous question. I am

waiting for her answer."

"Well, here it is," says I, holdin' out the hat.

Biggles, he gurgles something indignant and turns purple in the gills,

but he ends by snatchin' away the derby and marchin' stiff to the door.

"Understand," says he, with his hand on the knob, "I do not accept your

impertinence as a reply. I--I shall see Marion again."

"Sure you will," says I. "She'll be around to get your dinner order

early next week."

"Bah!" says Biggles, bangin' the door behind him.

But, say, inside of five minutes he'd been wiped off the slate, and them

two girls was plannin' their hot-food campaign as busy and excited as if

it was Marion's church weddin' they were doping out. It's after midnight

before they breaks away, too.

You know Vee, though. She ain't one to start things and then quit. She's

a stayer. And some grand little hustler, too. By Monday mornin' the

Harbor Hills Community Kitchen Co. was a going concern. And before the

week was out they had more'n forty families on the standin' order list,

with new squads of soup scorchers bein' fired every day.

What got a gasp out of me was the first time I gets sight of Marion Gray

in her working rig. Nothing old-maidish about that costume. Not so you'd

notice. She's gone the limit--khaki riding pants, leather leggins and a

zippy cloth cap cut on the overseas pattern. None of them Women's Motor

Corps girls had anything on her. And maybe she ain't some picture, too,

as she jumps in behind the wheel of the truck and steps on the gas

pedal!

Also, I was some jarred to learn that the enterprise was a payin' one

almost from the start. Folks was just tickled to death with havin'

perfectly good meals, well cooked, well seasoned and pipin' hot, set

down at their back doors prompt every day, with no fractious fryin'-pan

pirates growlin' around the kitchens, and no local food profiteers

soakin' 'em with big weekly bills.

This has been goin' on a month, when one day as I comes home Vee greets

me with a flyin' tackle.

"Oh, Torchy!" she squeals, "what do you think has happened?"

"I know," says I. "Baby's cut a tooth."

"No," says she. "It's--it's about Marion."

"Oh!" says I. "She ain't bumped somebody with the truck, has she?"

"How absurd!" says Vee. "But, listen, Captain Ellery Prescott has come

back."

"What! The old favorite?" says I. "But I thought he was over with

Pershing?"

"Not yet," says Vee. "He has been out at some Western camp training

recruits all this time. But now he has his orders. He is to sail very

soon. And he's seen Marion."

"Has he?" said I. "Did it give him a jolt, or what?"

Vee giggles and pulls my head down so she can whisper in my ear. "He

thought her perfectly stunning, as she is, of course. And they're to be

married day after tomorrow."

"Z-z-z-zing!" says I. "That puts a crimp in the ready-made dinner

business, I expect."

"Not at all," says Vee. "Until he comes back, after the war, Marion is

going to carry on."

"Anyway," says I, "it ends 'Puffy' Biggies as an impendin' tragedy,

don't it? And I expect that's worth while, too."