FullReads

“Well really, Young Authorettes,” he said, “I hardly know how to answer you or how to choose. Ether or Chloroform and general Disinfectants being the most familiar savors of my daily life,–the only savors indeed that I ever expect to suggest to anybody–” He looked out the window. There was an apple-blossom tree. It made the window look very full of June. His collar seemed to hurt him. It made him pretty serious. It made his voice all solemn.

“But I’ll tell you, Kiddies,” he said quite suddenly. “I’ll tell you the Sweetest Thing that I ever smelled in my life!–It was the first Summer I was back from College.–I was out on the Common playing ball. Somebody brought me word that my Father was dead.–I didn’t go home.–I slunk off instead to my favorite trout-brook–and sat down under a big white birch tree–and cursed!–I was very bitter. I needed my Father very much that year. And my step-mother was a harsh woman.–Late that night when I got home,–ugly with sorrow,–I found that I’d left my Catcher’s glove. It happened to be one that my Father had given me.–With matches and a tin-can lantern I fumbled my way back to the brook. The old glove lay palm-upward in the moss and leaves. Somebody had filled the palm with wild violets.–I put my face down in it–like a kid–and bawled my heart out.–It was little Annie Dun Vorlees it seemed who had put the violets there. Trailed me clear from the Ball Field. Little kid too. Only fourteen years to my twenty. Why her Mother wouldn’t even let me come to the house. Had made Annie promise even not to speak to me.–But when Trouble hit me, little Annie–?” The Old Doctor frowned his eyebrows. “Words!” he said. “It’s words after all that have the real fragrance to ’em!–Now take that word ‘Loyalty’ for instance. I can’t even see it in a Newspaper without–” He put back his head suddenly. He gave a queer little chuckle. “Sounds funny, doesn’t it, Kiddies,” he laughed, “to say that the sweetest thing you ever smelled in your life was an old baseball glove thrown down on the mossy bank of a brook?”

I looked at Carol. Carol looked at me. His eyes were popping. We ran to the Book. We snatched it open. It bumped our heads. We pointed to the writing. I read it out loud.

The most beautiful smell in the world is the smell of an
old tattered baseball glove that’s been lying in the damp
grass–by the side of a brook–in June Time.

My Mother looked funny.

“Good Gracious,” she said. “Are my children developing ‘Second Sight’?–First it was the ‘Field of Tulips’ already written down as their Father’s choice before he could even get the words out of his mouth!–And now, hours before the Old Doctor ever even dreamed of the Book’s existence they’ve got his distinctly unique taste in perfumes all–“

“But this isn’t the Old Doctor!” I cried out. “She wrote it herself. It’s the Lady down at the hotel. It’s the–the Empress that the Old Doctor was talking about!”

“The–Empress?” gasped the Old Doctor.

“Well maybe you said ‘Princess,'” I admitted. “It was some one from Austria anyway–come to fuss about the old Dun Vorlees place! You said it was! You said that’s who it was!–It’s the only Strange Lady in the village!”

“What?” gasped the Old Doctor. “What?” He looked at the book. He read the Lady’s writing. Anybody could have seen that it wasn’t our writing. It was too dressy. He put on his glasses. He read it again.

–the smell of an old tattered baseball glove–that’s been
lying in the damp grass–side of a brook–June Time.

“Good Lord!” he cried out. “Good Lord!”–He couldn’t seem to swallow through his collar. “Not anyone else!” he gasped. “In all the world!–There couldn’t possibly be anyone else! It must–It must be little Annie Dun Vorlees herself!”