CHAPTER V

A DEFECT IN THE TITLE

In spite of their having made such an early start in talking about gardens the members of the United Service Club did not weary of the idea or cease to plan for what they were going to do.  The only drawback that they found in gardening as a Club activity was that the gardens were for themselves and their families and they did not see exactly how there was any “service” in them.

“I’ll trust you youngsters to do some good work for somebody in connection with them,” asserted Grandfather Emerson one day when Roger had been talking over with him his pet plan for remodelling the old Emerson farmhouse into a place suitable for the summer shelter of poor women and children from the city who needed country air and relief from hunger and anxiety.

“We aren’t rushing anything now,” Roger had explained, “because we boys are all going to graduate this June and we have our examinations to think about.  They must come first with us.  But later on we’ll be ready for work of some sort and we haven’t anything on the carpet except our gardens.”

“There are many good works to be done with the help of a garden,” replied Mr. Emerson.  “Ask your grandmother to tell you how she has sent flowers into New York for the poor for many, many summers.  There are people right here in Rosemont who haven’t enough ground to raise any vegetables and they are glad to have fresh corn and Brussels sprouts sent to them.  If you really do undertake this farmhouse scheme there’ll have to be a large vegetable garden planted near the house to supply it, and you can add a few flower beds.  The old place will look better flower-dressed than empty, and perhaps some of the women and children will like to work in the garden.”

Roger went home comforted, for he was very loyal to the Club and its work and he did not want to become so involved with other matters that he could not give himself to the purpose for which the Club was organized—­helping others.

As he passed the Miss Clarks he stopped to give their furnace its nightly shaking, for he was the accredited furnace man for them and his Aunt Louise as well as for his mother.  He added the money that he earned to the treasury of the Club so that there might always be enough there to do a kind act whenever there should be a chance.

As he labored with the shaker and the noise of his struggles was sent upward through the registers a voice called to him down the cellar stairs.

“Ro-ger; Roger!”

“Yes, ma’am,” replied Roger, wishing the old ladies would let him alone until he had finished his work.

“Come up here, please, when you’ve done.”

“Very well,” he agreed, and went on with his racket.

When he went upstairs he found that the cause of his summons was the arrival of a young man who was apparently about the age of Edward Watkins, the doctor brother of Tom and Della.