“What do you think?” Judge Round asked him brightly. “Tell us your opinion!”
But neither of them waited for it. Estelle said with relish that the blue would fade.
Judge Round, with equal relish, agreed.
Both of them thought that dear Cassie had probably done her best, but it was a pity about that pink.
“Pink wouldn’t have faded,” Estelle said. “Well, Leonidas, come see us. I’m sure your electric bills will be enormous, but I suppose you know what you’re doing. It’s a great mercy that your Uncle Orrin’s estate was so large. You always did have spendthrift ways. All those books!”
“Do give my regards to Charles,” Leonidas said. “Er —the baskets. You’re forgetting them.”
“Oh, it’s the Welcome Committee. Dear me, I’ve forgotten the speech. It’s been so long since I’ve done this. Do you remember the speech, Hattie?”
Judge Round smiled.
“Welcome to Dalton, Mr. Witherall,” she said in the measured, fully rounded tones of an experienced clubwoman. “Welcome to Dalton, the Garden City, the City of Spotless Homes and Flowering Gardens. We hope your life here will be full and happy, that your children will spend happy, carefree hours in our lovely parks and modern playgrounds. Your children—”
“You’d best skip that part about children,” Estelle interrupted. “We’re in a hurry, and besides, he hasn’t any.”
Judge Round said that was stupid of her, wasn’t it? “Anyway, Mr. Witherall, we know you will find in our fair city every opportunity to carry on in peace and quiet your scholarly research.”
“What research?” Leonidas inquired. No one in his right mind could ever refer to the Lieutenant Haseltine series as scholarly research.
“With all those books,” Judge Round said, “we know you’re up to something! And Dalton’s just the proper, quiet, restful place. Isn’t it, Estelle?”
“It is, up here. I told Charles I couldn’t stand living so far away from things. Two miles from a loaf of bread!”
“But the solitude! Think of the lovely solitude!” Judge Round said. “Just the place for inspiration and all that sort of thing. We know, Mr. Witherall, that you will find much happiness in your little haven. So,” she consulted her watch, “so it gives me great pleasure to welcome you, on behalf of Dalton and our civic organizations, including the Tuesday Club and the Republican Club, and the—”
“The rest don’t matter,” Estelle said. “We do all the work, anyway. I think it’s a shame the others get their names in. Well, Leonidas, there are tags on everything,” she pointed to the beribboned hampers, “telling where they came from and who donated them, and you’re supposed to trade there. Give him the cards, Hattie. We really didn’t expect you’d be home, Leonidas. We just rang to hear the tune. We intended to put the things inside the hall, and go.”
“Come, Estelle,” the judge said hurriedly. “Come. Good-by, Mr. Witherall. We hope you will be very happy in your restful haven.”
Leonidas cocked an eyebrow as he watched the coupe being laboriously backed and turned.
So they were just going to put the things inside the hall, were they? That implied the possession of a key. He would speak sharply to Cassie, and have her recall any keys that she might have doled out in her enthusiasm. Cassie should have known better than to let Estelle Otis poke her nose inside his house.
He turned and looked at the hampers.
The contents ran the gamut from bottles of silver polish and astringent lotion to a tasteful bouquet of vegetables, from packets of flower seeds to boxes of steel wool, and an assortment of literature from the Dalton Chamber of Commerce.
The bunch of cards tied with purple ribbon, which the judge had thrust in his hand, was even more bizarre. By presenting one card or another, he was entitled to a free permanent wave at Madame Sade’s, ten gallons of free gasoline, a free window cleaning, a free lawn mowing, a free floor polishing, a free dental examination with the first cavity filled free, a free palm reading at the Dalton Gipsy Tea Shoppe, and a free evening of bowling at Dinty’s Tavern and Snack Bar Bowling Alleys.
Leonidas dumped both the hampers and the cards into the hall closet, along with the mound of brushes.
Then he made two neat signs that said, “I LIKE IT,” and put one in a front window, and one in the kitchen window. That was to reassure Cassie and Dow.
Then he hurried up the circular stairs.
A luxuriously stocked linen closet caught his eye. He felt the texture of a blue percale sheet, and wondered if perhaps Cassie hadn’t gone a little too far with the monograms. Everything in sight, including the face cloths and the box of colored soap, bore his initials.
He investigated two small guest rooms separated by a bath, and the large room and bath which he decided must be his own. The bathrooms, with their colored fixtures and gleaming chromium taps, definitely awed him until he noticed two small sailboats in the green tub off his bedroom. If Jock could sail boats in that Lucullan thing, Leonidas thought, he certainly should feel unruffled about taking a bath in it.
His old spool bed in the bedroom looked strange to him, and he tried to figure out why. For one thing, it had been refinished. But it looked higher up, somehow, and less bumpy.
He sat on it, tentatively.
A new mattress. That was it.
He swung his legs upon the spread, stretched out, and looked through the casement windows over the sun deck to the Carnavon Hills.
It was very restful and very comfortable.
Maybe his new house was going to turn out to be a restful haven, after all.
The afternoon sun was streaming through the windows when he was awakened, several hours later, by a series of war whoops.
Cassie and Dow had finally arrived.
“Bill!” Cassie’s startlingly snow-white hair brushed his face as she kissed him enthusiastically. “Bill, you really do
